


thicker than forget

by aRegularJo



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, hopefully, let's see what happens when they're acting like adults, way in the future
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-21
Updated: 2014-11-28
Packaged: 2017-12-24 04:31:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 84,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/935387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aRegularJo/pseuds/aRegularJo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four years after leaving New York and ACN, Maggie comes back at a moment when everyone's lives are in flux.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> So I started writing short short pieces (for me) about Don/Sloan since they deserve more, and then this longer piece, set a ways in the future (I say 2018 or 2019) started developing. It started adding characters, and so is fully an ensemble piece. While this chapter is largely about Maggie, every major character is involved — especially Don, Sloan, Will, and Mac. And Jim, because you can't do a Maggie story without Jim.
> 
> The title comes from an ee cummings poem: "love is more thicker than forget/more thinner than recall/more seldom than a wave is wet/more frequent than to fail." I don't own characters or the poem.

You leave home, you move on, you do the best you can - Miranda Lambert, The House That Built Me

Prologue

April 3

Nearly ten years after she first moved to New York, Maggie still firmly believes there is magic in the city's springtime. The city's hustle seems lighter and happier: Kids wearing t-shirts dance home from school; coffee dates unfurl on patios; nannies and runners bask in the good weather. It's been almost four years since she left her first big city; while Atlanta is fun and she's made friends and having no winter is great, there's something perpetually romantic about New York that isn't present in Atlanta. It's good to be back, even if it's for work and for two days.

"You know, if I didn't know how busy you were, I might think you were avoiding me and I would get offended."

Maggie looks up at the shadow that crossed her table. "If I didn't know better, I'd think you were stalking me," she replies with a smirk. "Hi, Don."

Her ex-boyfriend reaches down to hug her. "How's it going, Maggie?" He grabs a chair from the next table, and swings it around so he can rest his arms on the back while still facing her.

"Well," she says, closing her book. "How are you?"

"I'm great. I've emailed you a few times. I've even called."

"As you said, I've been busy. But it looks like you followed me to this cafe. How did you find me, exactly?"

"I called your office, and they said you'd stepped out to lunch. I figured there were exactly three restaurants by CNN to try. This was the second one I got to."

"How very entrepreneurial of you," she smiles. "Though usually you're better at reading signs. And signs said I didn't want to talk to you."

"Too bad I'm such a dogged journalist," he grins. "No, seriously. I want to know. How's Atlanta? I haven't talked to you in forever. You look good. The hair?" he motions under his chin, signaling, short. "It's good."

"Thanks. And … yeah. Atlanta's great. Time flies, you know? I've been traveling a lot, there's good people, so much fun. Work keeps me busy. What about you? You're at NBC now, right? And Sloan? She's at Bloomberg still?" She runs a hand through her chin-length, honey-brown bob. He looks good — his hair is close-cropped but product-free and curly, and he's wearing jeans and a light, checked button-down under a dark blue sweater and gray blazer. It's very J. Crew — a far cry from his days of slept-in flannel shirts.

"Yes and yes. She's great. She's managing editor for three hours a day and loves it," he grins. "You've been avoiding me," he smiles and taps his knuckles on the table.

Caught off-guard, she says, "I have not!"

He gives her a look that clearly says she is transparent, and she guiltily says, "Well, you know, work, and life, and suddenly, bam! It's been, what, four years?"

"Almost," he says. "Anyways. I wanted to invite you to dinner."

"Dinner?"

"Yes. Our place. 7:30 tonight. MacKenzie and Will are coming, so you can't say no."

"I mean, yes, I want to see you, this isn't personal, but I have plans tonight," she lies, her stomach sinking, because Don absolutely can tell lying vs. not-lying.

"Bullshit," he says, his voice affable. "Come on. We want to catch up. We miss you around here, Mags."

She caves. "7:30?"

"Yeah. I may be late, but Sloan's home by 5:30. We're at 160 Riverside Drive, Apartment 14A. It's by …"

"I may have moved but I remember how to get to your place," she says wryly. "I'll see you then."

"Sounds great!" he says. "And don't worry — Sloan isn't cooking."

She smiles, wanly. An evening with her ex-coworkers is not exactly something that interests her, but she knows Don Keefer's tenacious side well. "I have to go," she says. "My lunch is over."

"Of course," he says. "We'll see you tonight."

At 7:30, a bottle of wine in hand, she rings the bell, nervously, at 160 Riverside Drive, Apartment 14A. It's a gorgeous co-op in a renovated pre-war building. It's slightly gothic, very West Side, a block from the Hudson and four from the park. There's a smaller neighborhood playground on the corner and a dog run, as well as the Soldiers and Sailors Monument, down the block. It's idyllic, in a Woody Allen-movie way.

She's braced herself for Sloan or possibly Don to answer the door, not Mac with a four-year-old boy looped in her arms. She stares for a second, jaw down. "Oh, Maggie," Mac exclaims, holding one arm wide to embrace her. "Come in, come in. It is so good to see you," she lets the hug linger. "You remember Max. Max, this is Maggie. You should say hi." She blinks, hard, when she sees him, then blinks several more times to keep an unexpected (but not unsurprising) surge of tears at bay. He is so big.

"Hi," Max says brightly. His hair is very, very dark chestnut, possibly even black. His curls, nose, and chin are all Don's, but he's got Sloan's greenish eyes and a mischievous smile. He's dressed in pants and a top from two different sets of pajamas. "Are you here to play? I have my trains out and I know how to share." She opens her mouth, but can't really speak.

"Maggie's here for dinner with me, your mommy, your daddy, and Will," Mac jumps in. "Maggie used to work with mommy and daddy and now she lives in Atlanta."

"Hi," she says, awkwardly, at last. "Nice to meet you, Max." She thinks she saw him last when he was nine months old, so 'meet' is perfectly appropriate.

"Why don't you go play with your trains, Max?" Mac smiles, and the kid runs off. "Remember to put them away when you are done!" She calls after him, then turns to Maggie. "I'm sorry. Don is running just a few minutes late, so Will is helping Sloan with the girls' bedtime and then they'll be out. It shouldn't take very long."

"Will is helping with bedtime?"

She nods, smiling. "He does the best funny voices."

Sloan comes down the stairs (it was definitely a one-story apartment when they first moved in) and smiles broadly when she sees her. "Maggie!" she exclaims, coming to hug her. "So good to see you. You look great."

So do you," she says, and it's true. Sloan still talks crazy-fast and has that full-on stare, but she looks completely relaxed in her home. She's barefoot with wine-red toes, wearing a white Oxford shirt and calf-length black leggings. Her hair, longer and with more layers than the last time Maggie saw her in person, is parted and half pulled back in a clip. She wears very little makeup, and is just as unfairly willowy as she was when they were working together.

"Can I get you anything to drink? We have beer, red wine, white wine, water..."

"White wine would be great," she smiles, and Sloan heads toward the kitchen. Before she can get very far, though, the door clicks open, and Max streaks past them, yelling, "DADDY!" A dog — Clementine, the black-and-white Portuguese water dog they got right after they got married, as a test-run for kids — follows him, toenails clicking, and it's all Maggie can do to refrain from rolling her eyes at the New York perfection of it all. It's Upper West Side apartment porn. She's briefly reminded of Rebecca Halliday and her preference for the UWS. She wonders if she lives in the building.

"Max!" Sloan exasperates, "Quiet voice, sweetheart, you're inside." He's way past them, though, so Sloan finishes her chiding as an aside to Mac, "And your sisters are trying to get to sleep, but why do you care if that happens?" They both laugh a little.

Don has picked his little boy up, though, and stuck his head under the spaceship PJ top, blowing a raspberry onto his stomach. Max laughs mirthfully, and Sloan says, as a head's up, "The girls aren't down yet." Quickly throwing them an 'oops' look, Don extracts his head and swings his son onto his hip.

"Sorry, babe," he says, and the two of them quickly kiss.

"It's fine," she says reassuringly. "Do you want to go say goodnight? Last I checked on them, there was a very involved retelling of 'Knuffle Bunny' still going on."

"That would be great," and he lets Max slide down his leg. He heads up to the girls' bedroom, Max returns to wherever his trains are, Clementine follows Max, and Sloan says, "Let me get you that glass of wine," before disappearing into the kitchen. She quickly returns and says, somewhat awkwardly, "I'm sorry it's so crazy — the girls' bedtime is 7:30, which the earliest Don gets home, which is also the edge of acceptability for dinner invitations these days."

"It's fine," Maggie says. "I'm sure it must be crazy all the time. How, um, how old are the girls now?" She wishes she could remember their names — she'd definitely gotten the birth announcement.

"Fifteen months. They're pretty independent. Emerson's sassy, definitely the one who likes digging in the dirt and climbing way too high on the jungle gym. Susannah is more of a girly-girl, but she's sneakier. Emerson tells you before she starts wreaking havoc," Sloan smiles. Names. Thank god.

"I can't imagine Don with teenaged daughters."

"Neither can he," Sloan laughs. "Anyways, how are you? We've missed you. How is Atlanta?"

Maggie looks around. "I'm great. It's great. How about you? Have you redecorated? It looks different."

"Since you've been here last? Yes, I think so. When was the last time you came over?"

Taking a swill of wine, she says, "Um, right before I moved. Probably Max's christening."

"Okay. Yeah, we actually purchased the unit above us when the building went condo and then combined the two so we had enough space. We were really lucky that the upstairs neighbor was happy to sell; otherwise we would have had to move when the girls were born. Renovating was a complete bitch, though. Here, I'll give you a tour."

Downstairs is the kitchen, living room, dining room, breakfast nook, laundry room, a huge library/media center, a family room complete with gym equipment, and a home office with five TVs. Most of the rooms have fantastic views of the Hudson and the bridge. An east-facing terrace snakes along next to the library and looks over the city — she can see the park peeking through the buildings. Upstairs are all the bedrooms, along with an extra one for when the girls get older and are separated, a playroom, and a guest suite. Her favorite part is Max's room, with 'Where the Wild Things Are' murals and a treehouse bed with a slide. They don't go into the girls' room, but she can hear Will reading animatedly.

The whole place is pretty open and modern, but with plenty of pre-war accents — subway tile in the sleek, dark-wood kitchen; built-in bookshelves everywhere; arched entryways; thick crown molding on the windowsills; clean parquet floors; gorgeous expansive windows. It's also pretty homey — there is child-made artwork on the fridge and taped on the walls in the office; there are dishes stacked in the kitchen sink and toys on the floor; books and personal art and family photos are everywhere. She notices a few from their spur-of-the-moment City Hall wedding six years ago. As they're returning to the kitchen, Don and Will slink down the stairs.

"They have trouble getting to sleep?" Sloan asks.

"Annie crashed two pages in. Emmy needed 'Don't Let Pigeon Drive the Bus,'" Will says. At the ridiculousness of that statement — the nicknames, the book titles, the mental picture of Will doing the 'funny voices' — Maggie lets out a quick bark of a laugh, which she quickly suppresses.

"Sorry. Just … Hi, Will," she smiles. "How are you?" It wasn't just a cursory greeting: Will had taken a leave of absence from News Night a month ago for 'health reasons,' which she had quickly found out was a bad bout of pneumonia. She'd sent flowers and called Mac, but had just received a terse 'we're doing fine, will keep you posted darling!' in return.

"I'm well, thank you, Maggie," he smiles. "How's CNN treating you?"

"It's going well. I'm traveling a lot. I just went to California for the earthquake and South Korea for the Olympics," she says. Sloan disappears for a minute, and Don begins pulling out plates and cups, which MacKenzie starts carrying out to the terrace as Will asks Maggie about work. When Sloan returns, she pulls a few bags of Chinese food out of the fridge and informs her husband, quietly, that the 'Wild Thing' is watching a movie.

"Hopefully he'll just pass out," Don mutters back, running a hand along his wife's spine. Maggie watches them, with a pang for this life, this busy, full, expansive, fulfilling, life. Sloan smiles and reaches up to thumb his cheekbone before reaching up to the wine rack.

"Everyone ready?" she says, meting out three glasses of red and handing one each to Will and Mac. Don grabs a beer from the fridge and the monitor to the girls' room. They settle on the patio, Don and Sloan both positioning themselves so they can see into the library, which has windows that look directly onto the outdoor space. Craning her head, she can see Max, tucked up under a few blankets, nodding off to what looks like one of the Despicable Me movies in the library. Clementine is sprawled on top of him as well.

"Great babysitter there, Sabbith," Will remarks, and it's clearly a light dig.

"Bite me," Sloan replies, chomping down on an egg roll.

And just like that, they're talking and laughing like she never left New York. She learns about Sloan's show on Bloomberg; how Emerson and Susannah learned to walk; MacKenzie's attempt to take Max to the aquarium, which ended in a panic attack; and Will and MacKenzie's tiny one-witness wedding in Italy, as well as their massive blowout on a yacht once they got back to New York. She'd been invited, but had sent a blender instead. It had been less than a month after she'd left New York, and she couldn't bear the thought of returning.

About an hour after they sit down, Don and Sloan excuse themselves. Maggie watches them through the window into the library, sees Sloan carefully gather Max in her arms, Don helping her support his head, and then walk slowly out as Don cleans up and deals with the dog.

"They're a good team," Mac says fondly as she watches them exit. At first Maggie assumes the remark is cagily directed at her, but Mac continues, "You think we'll have that, Billy?"

He smiles a real smile. "Yeah. I think we will."

"Are you two pregnant?" she blurts out, startling them out of her reverie. Because while it's cute, that it took them over a decade to find each other, they're both on the older side now.

"No," Will says, quickly.

"But … we are adopting," Mac confirms, just as quickly. She bites her lip lightly, studying Maggie, trying to gauge her reaction.

"Wow," Maggie says, slightly stunned. She schools her face carefully. "That's great. Do you have photos?"

Mac quickly pulls out a cell phone and flicks to a photo, then spins it around. "That's Naureen. Nora. She's three. She's in an orphanage in Peshawar, but she'll be ours in about two months. We're hoping to have her by the Fourth." The little girl is skinny, with startlingly large eyes and a wide smile.

"I'm so excited for you!" Maggie says, and she does really mean it. "She can come in and do News Night and be a producer by the age of five, and cover the Dora the Explorer beat."

The two of them exchange a look and, emboldened by the wine, Maggie says, "What am I missing?"

"She might come in and be a producer, but it won't be of News Night."

She leans forward, elbows on her knees. "Are you not going back to News Night?"

"Don't be ridiculous," Will says. "Of course I am."

"Yeah, for how long, Will?" Don says, coming out and sliding the door shut behind him carefully.

"About four months."

Her jaw drops. "Then what will you do?"

"Weekly newsmagazine. Sunday nights, one hour long, two in-depth segments and a roundtable discussion."

"Why?"

"They kicked my favorite producer upstairs and gave me some new guy."

She stares at Will and Mac. "That's horrible! Mac, you've been good, you've been loyal, they can't just replace you with some snazzy young flake!"

"Why don't you elaborate a bit, Will?" Don prompts, one eyebrow cocked, and she gets the distinct feeling she's missing something. "Because the snazzy young flake might take issue with that statement."

Will rolls his eyes, but says, "MacKenzie here has been promoted to SVP of special investigations. Given that, plus the fact that we're adopting this little girl and we all know I won't be around to see her kids grow up, I thought it would be nice to scale back a bit. So I'll be doing a weekly newsmagazine and handling the pickups and the drop-offs and the bath time and the … whatever."

"He's going to pick up Max from preschool too, aren't you, Will?" Sloan asks, sliding the door behind her and crawling into her husband's chair, swinging her legs over his lap. "We'll send them to preschool together and you can pick up Max and take him home and play trains and make him ants on a log."

"Why the fuck would I feed kids ants, Sloan?" Will practically growls. Sloan and Don share an eyeroll as Sloan plays with the curls on the nape of Don's neck.

"One day," Sloan sighs.

"Who is the flaky new producer?" Maggie prompts, pulling everyone back on track.

They all look at each other, and she does the math. "Don?"

"Yup," he says, slightly bashfully.

"You're going to News Night?"

"Yup."

"You've … done this before." At NBC, he was the senior executive producer of the Nightly News and the New York news director. She knew he was overseeing plenty of long-term projects: The 2016 elections, plenty of international coverage, investigations on voter disenfranchisement, standardized-testing cheating rings, regime falls, the death penalty and race, and political scandals like the NSA tracking. He also had a much bigger audience, and could get home by 7:30 nightly. "Like, it's great, but you've done cable news EP, you did it with Elliot."

Don smiles enigmatically. "I can't tell you how, Ms. CNN, but it will be different. I promise."

She knows she needs to take it at face value, so she says, "I'm sorry for calling you a snazzy flake." She knows there must be more going on, but she takes it for now.

They laugh. "I've been called worse."

"Sloan, are you moving back to ACN?"

Sloan shakes her head and laughs. "No way. My last year at ACN, I got sent to two hurricanes. At Bloomberg, I cover what I want to cover. Until ACN can promise I won't traipse around South Florida in crazy boots anymore, I'm staying put."

"You looked cute in the boots," Don says.

"You looked ridiculous in the boots," Mac laughs.

"Who knows — I know a few people over there," Sloan says, one eyebrow cocked at her husband.

Everyone laughs, and then Sloan pats Don's back and says, "It's getting chilly. Let's get this cleaned up and go inside."

"I'll help," MacKenzie volunteers.

Maggie, Will, and Don linger as the other two begin gathering dishes and plates. She knows she should help, but it's a gorgeous night and she just … misses New York. There, she said it. CNN is great and Atlanta is nicer weather, but New York was always the dream. It was her first city.

"It's good city, Maggie," Will says, taking a sip of bourbon. "You should come back here."

"Give me a job and I'll think about it," she smiles.

Will and Don exchange another look. "And that's my cue to go," Will says, gathering the leftover placemats.

When he's gone, Maggie looks bluntly at Don. "Ok. What the fuck am I missing?"

"What do you mean?" Don asks, pushing the lone remaining wine bottle towards her.

She sighs, pours herself a glass. "I mean … A. You called me about nine times today, which is double the number of times we've talked since I moved. You tracked me down for something. B. Sloan's show airs at noon, which means she is in around 6:30, at the latest, each morning. But if you're on NewsNight, you're not home till 10, at the earliest, each night. So when are you going to see your wife with this job? And C. You're one of the most ambitious people I know, Don. You want president of a news division, hell, maybe a whole network, and you want it before you're 50. So why are you going back to EP-ing a show you did more than five years ago?"

"Because I'm not going to be the EP," he says simply.

She sits back. "What do you mean?"

"I'm there to ease Will off the air as a favor. I'll be leading the search for a new anchor and EP. As soon I get the show off the ground, I'm taking over as SVP of primetime and breaking news. I'll be overseeing all the shows from 5 till 11 and getting us to be better, faster, with stories in general."

"Oh," she says, because that makes perfect sense. He won't have to be in the studio most days, can get away with watching from home and relying on EPs.

"It'll be four months with a headset, tops," he says.

"Charlie's grooming you," she deduces. It makes sense — he is approaching 75.

He shrugs. "Nothing's written in stone, but it's a good opportunity."

"That's amazing," she says. "Congratulations. You'll be great." She really, really means it. But then she realizes he absolutely can't be telling her things, so she socks him in the shoulder.

"Hey! I have three kids to pick up," he moans, rubbing the non-bruise.

"You can't tell me these things! I work at a competitor, you dipwad! Telling me this is unethical! I could use this information against you!"

"Yeah...About that," he says. "What would you say about, you know, not working for a competitor?"

"I need a job, Don," she says, in a 'duh' voice.

"Well clearly," he says. "I meant, what do you think about working at ACN in New York again?"

"Excuse me?" she blinks.

"I need a senior producer at 8 p.m.," he says, and her jaw drops. "I need someone who knows ACN, gets what I want without me having to explain three times, has experience. You said it yourself — I have kids, and 8 p.m. is the worst time slot for that. Particularly as I'm launching the show and managing the SVP duties, I need someone to help set the tone, manage the day-to-day and back me up." `

She's struck. She knew that was the path she was on — she's a news producer, after all — but she didn't expect it at ACN, from her long-ago ex, at this point in her life.

But while she likes Atlanta, it is not New York. And she loves New York. She loves the busy, center-of-the-world feeling she gets living in New York. She loves the subway and the overpriced lattes and how, when she works until past midnight, so are a million other people. She loves morning runs in Central Park and arguing with cabbies. She wants this.

"I'll take it," she says. "Just one condition."

"Shoot," Don says.

"I can't work with Jim Harper."


	2. Don

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed the prologue! I'm happy and surprised I turned this over so quickly. This chapter features Don! Happy, confident, married-and-kicking-ass Don. Hopefully our favorite insecure lovable asshole is still recognizable under all this well-shouldered responsibility. We get appearances by Sloan, Charlie and Mac, and learn a little more about what exactly happened with Jim and Maggie.

Love is a high inducement to the individual to ripen, to become something in himself, to become world for himself for another's sake, it is a great exacting claim upon him, something that chooses him out and calls him to vast things." — Rilke

May 16

Don Keefer is on top of the motherfucking world.

He's not one ever given to hyperbole, and rarely to drama, so the statement is pretty damn close to accurate. He has a gorgeous, funny, genius-smart wife whom he is still crazy about, who takes his breath away whenever he stops and thinks for a second. He falls more in love with her each day, each month, each year, as they laugh and argue and flirt and raise kids and balance careers and get older together. He has three healthy, smart, hilarious kids, and he gets to watch them find out more about the world each day. His mom is kicking it, and happier than she was when he was growing up. He's close to his siblings and likes his in-laws. He's got great friends. He's about to start a dream job, earlier than he ever anticipated getting the position.

He leaves NBC at the end of April but is mandated to take a month off, per the terms of his contract, so he and Sloan take the kids out to visit her parents at their California place. They're getting better at flying, thank god, and take the six A.M. flight so the kids sleep through the first half. Once they're in San Francisco, they all spend four days at her parents' house, then Nami and Tom keep the kids while the two of them go to Napa for four days, then they take the kids back and spend another six, just the five of them, at Sloan's family's beach house in Carmel. It's peaceful and rejuvenating. The girls figure out how to build sandcastles, and Max figures out exactly how many buckets of water it will take to soak sandcastles built by impatient toddlers. It's great.

When they come back, he's got another two weeks off, and he gets to be a stay-at-home dad when Sloan goes back to her 10-hour-plus days. It's glorious. He still has one of the nannies (they have two, since both are in grad school) come in at least three days a week, and schedules conference calls and meetings so he can hit the ground running June 1, since ACN primetime is a fucking ossified hot mess. But otherwise it's sneaking Max out of preschool (whatever, he can read already), and going to the museums and biking in the park and playing with the dog and day trips to the beach.

The four of them and Smith are out on Coney Island, and enjoying ice cream on the boardwalk, when he gets a call from Mac. "Yo," he says, hastily wiping chocolate off of Emma's mouth. She bats his hand away irritably, preferring to try and lick the chocolate herself.

"How's your time off going, buster?" she asks.

"Oh, you know. Eating ice cream on Coney Island. The hard life," he drawls. "What's up? You guys want to do dinner on Saturday?" They haven't seen Mac and Will since before they left for California.

"Sure, but I'm actually calling about work," she starts.

It's going to be great, working with Mac again. Nobody at NBC gives shit as freely or as lovingly as Mac. He'll have nominal authority over her, since he'll basically be running the news division for Charlie, but they're mostly going to work together. She is going to be fantastic at special programming.

"What's up?" he asks. "Annie, no honey, don't take that shoe off," he says, catching her trying to unbuckle her silver Mary Janes. "I'm listening."

"I got a call from Jim today," she says.

"How's Riyadh?" He hasn't had a whole lot of contact with Jim Harper in the last four years, just a few emails here and there. Since Jim had relocated to the Middle East following The Accident, only Mac had really heard from him regarding anything remotely personal, and even then he'd only ever reached out to her with ACN stuff. The last email Don had gotten was a congratulations email following the twins' birth. He'd emailed back a thank you and left the door open, but Jim hadn't taken the opportunity. Don knew that returning to ACN meant he'd probably come into orbit with Jim again, at least tangentially, but the degree to which Jim had cut off ties had been extraordinary.

"He's based in Ankara now, actually," Mac says. "Has been for about a year. I thought I'd mentioned that? Anyways, I thought it was going alright … But he wants to come home."

"Come home?"

"Back to the States. He asked me if he could be tagged out, and if we had anything open in New York."

Don knocks his head back against the bench with a thud, since Sloan decided they couldn't say fuck around the kids. "Seriously? He wants to come back to New York? Now?"

"Yes. I said that you would call him. We have to find a place for him stateside once he's done two terms overseas, which he has, if he asks. It's in his contract."

And Don knows exactly what position Jim should get: international news director. Elise Rostow, who's run the desk for almost twenty years, wants to simply produce for the three senior international correspondents. The last assistant director moved to Fox six months ago and they haven't made a move on the position. Jim coming back to fill it would be great for the company.

"OK, for the record, I can't believe I'm saying this and it's almost emasculating," Don says. "But Maggie specifically said that she would not work with Jim, and she's already quit her job and sold her apartment to take the News Night gig. You get both their crazy better than I do. Is this going to be a headache?"

"I don't know," she says.

"Have they patched things up since they left?"

"I have no idea."

"Can we trust them to not make it a thing in the newsroom, especially if they're on different teams?" His eyes follow Clem and Max as they begin to run up and down the boardwalk. The girls are still smearing ice cream on their faces.

"I hope so, but I have no idea, and quite frankly I doubt it."

He sighs, and pinches his nose. He doesn't trust either of them, at all, to not turn this into a Thing and have big pontificating fights in full public view. He's pretty sure that once she finds out, Maggie will corner him and yell irrational things, and Maggie kind of scares him when she's in that mode, since he is used to dealing with Sloan, who is never irrational, which is in and of itself, irrational. He respects both Maggie and Jim, as people and journalists; he would love to have them both on his staff. And as a friend and as a parent, he can't imagine going through what they went through together and surviving. But he also knows them, and knows that whatever happens won't be pretty, or calm, or done quietly and without sucking everyone else in, either.

"They're in their thirties," he finally whines, wiping down Annie's hands. "They've been doing this bullsh — this crap for a good eight years now. It was problematic eight years ago. Why can't we, you know ..."

"Move on?"

"Well no, but also, yes. Exactly. Get off the fucking merry-go-round." Whoops. He turns. Neither girl was really paying attention.

"True love never did run smooth," Mac sages.

He groans. "Are you going to be able to not meddle, and inflame a situation that will already basically have gasoline poured all over this?"

"That was my deadpan English humor," Mac complains.

"My Mac's-English-to-American-English dictionary is at home, sorry," he says. He sighs again. He has real problems to deal with, but today, it looks like he's got to solve this one. And the mystery of where the hell Emerson's left shoe went. Somehow she had gotten a freaking Converse all the way off. "Alright, Mac, text me his phone number? I'm going to give him a call when I've got a sec."

He finds the red ladybug sneaker kicked under the boardwalk, and the kids tire out soon after that. He loads them into the car for the ride back home. His prayer that they fall asleep in their car seats is answered, so he plugs his phone into the car system and tells it to call Jim.

"H'ro?" Jim says, voice cackling a little through the air.

"Hey man, it's Don. How ya doin? Mac gave me your number."

"Oh, hey. How've you been?"

"I'm good. Sorry — I'm in the car. Is now a good time to talk? I realized I'm not sure what the time difference is."

"No, it's fine. It's about 9 here. Congrats on the new job, by the way. That's amazing. Welcome back to ACN."

"Thanks, man," he hesitates, then decides he's no longer close enough (if he ever was) to prolong this conversation. "I heard you may be moving stateside as well?"

"I'd like to, yeah. I talked to Mac about it today. She said she'd talk to you."

"Yeah, and I know your contract says we bring you back if you want back. I've got a few ideas and I'm going to talk to Charlie. I feel like I need to give you a head's up, though: Maggie's coming back to New York. She's signed on to be senior producer for News Night. She starts at the beginning of June."

The line goes quiet, and Don clears his throat. "I don't know if that makes a difference, but I wanted you to know. She's already quit her job, bought a new apartment, it's not something we can just take back. She's coming to New York. I want you back, Jimmy, I just need to know that you can work in the … general vicinity of her."

The line is silent for a minute. "That's great, that she wants to come back to New York. We'll be good. I mean, I can't speak for her. But I'll be good."

Don needs to be sure. Plane tickets and new employees are both expensive. "Because I'm only asking once."

"You only need to ask once," Jim says reassuringly.

From the back, Max stirs. "Daddy, Ms. Liv says you gotta turn off your voice during naptime," he says, sleepily.

"Sorry, buddy," he says, but Max is already back out. Jim is conspicuously quiet. "I'll talk to Charlie tomorrow," he promises, "and then get back in touch."

"Great. Talk to you soon," Jim says. "Have a good one."

The kids are waking up by the time he gets home, thank god, since getting two toddlers and a preschooler upstairs without one of them waking up is beyond even his admittedly ace dad skills. He tries calling Charlie to chat with him twice, but it goes straight to voicemail. Weird.

Sloan finds them in a blanket fort in the playroom a few hours later. "Mama! We made a fort. Come on in," Max yells when they hear her enter downstairs.

"What's down here?" she says a few minutes later, kicking off her boots and entering. The girls are lying on their backs, giggling and playing something on the iPad, and Max is making faint shadow puppets as Don holds a flashlight.

"A party," Max answers tartly.

"Mama!" both girls shriek, standing and running toward her. Emma's got the tablet, so they settle into her lap and immediately start showing her the game as she smooths back their hair to kiss their foreheads. Weighed down by the kids, she just reaches out and squeezes his hand in greeting as he keeps holding the flashlight for Max.

"What did we do today with unemployed Daddy?" she asks after the girls are done.

"We go to beach and eat ice cream," Susannah says.

"And choc'late," Emerson adds.

"Jeez guys, that was a secret from Mama," he laughs.

"I like unemployed. I didn't go to school," Max says seriously. "Can we be unemployed all the time?"

"Absolutely not," Sloan says."Sorry, bud," she turns to her husband. "By the way, speaking of unemployment, Charlie called me. Said you called him but when he tried to call you back, you didn't pick up?" she raises an eyebrow and he groans internally. He knows she absolutely hates it when people — anyone, even Charlie or Elliot or Mac — calls her when they can't get ahold of him for professional reasons. Personal, fine. But she thinks professional makes her a secretary. He doesn't agree, necessarily, but it's not worth arguing over. He fishes his cell out of his back pocket and yep, there's a missed call from Charlie, as well as another five or six.

"I should call him back," he says, scrolling through his messages.

"Alright, but let's get dinner soon," Sloan says, tickling the twins.

"I want pizza. PIZZA!" Max shouts excitedly.

"Pizza, pizza!" Emerson says, as Susannah nods and sing-songs, "Cheese please!" which is something that Amelia, Elliot's youngest, taught her. Their parents exchange looks over their heads and laugh.

"Whatever," Sloan shakes her head. "They already had their appetites ruined with all the chocolate and ice cream anyways," she teases. "You guys good to play in here?" she asks, as she stands to duck and leave. With a chorus of 'yes'es, they both trip out of the tiny fort.

"I'm going to steam some vegetables, too," she says.

"Sounds good," he says, distracted, but then feels a twinge of guilt. "How was work? We were on the beach, so I didn't catch the show."

She shrugs, thumbing through her phone for the pizza place. "Good. The euro is going to drag the whole world down with it, but that's not really news anymore, is it? What does Charlie want that couldn't wait?"

He shrugs. "Jim wants to move back stateside. Charlie and I have to find a place for him."

She snorts. "Reuniting the band," she says.

"I'm a regular Pete Best," he agrees.

"Brian Epstein," she corrects.

"Who?"

"Pete Best was the first drummer, who got replaced by Ringo. Brian Epstein was the manager. You should listen when Will talks, sometimes."

"You thought Justin Timberlake was in the Backstreet Boys for more than 10 years," he retorts, smirking. That one was one of his favorite Sloan facts to find out, ever. "And the band's not quite all back together."

He knows she knows what he means, but ignores it. "That was a legitimate mistake. And good luck getting Neal to come back, since ProPublica is basically paying him to goof off on the Internet all day."

"Yeah, but I don't like looking at him as much as I like looking at you," he says bluntly, so she can't avoid the comment.

She sighs, and sets down her phone. They've touched tangentially on this before, the possibility of her making the jump to ACN, which he wants to have happen. A lot of that is personal, obviously: He works best when she's around. He would love to be able to pop down to the studio to watch her tape again, to hide in her office when Charlie is after him, to grab breakfast with her, to bring Smith in to work again since they can alternate whose office he's parked in.

Beyond that, though, ACN is a better fit for her. She's one of the best in the business, and Bloomberg keeps her cloistered. She does more for their brand than it does for hers. Worse, since she is their big star, she can walk all over their producers without even noticing it, so nobody's pushing her to be more and do more as a journalist. So he's worried that, in five years when she wants to get a little bit more back in the game (she moved to dayside news to be done by 5 each day), it won't be as easy as it could be. "Don, you would be my boss, that's just too …"

"Too what?"

"Complicated," she finishes.

"I would diagonally outrank you," he says, "if you were on dayside, which is where you want to be, I thought. You would still probably make more money. I think it's actually pretty even."

"I like Bloomberg."

"Bloomberg's for insiders. You got into journalism to help regular people know what's going on. On ACN, you can do the same type of stuff, but get your information to the people who need to understand it. You can do more good at ACN."

"You say that now, but you would also acknowledge the ratings mandate ACN has that Bloomberg doesn't because of those viewer differences," she says. "And if I'm on dayside news — which I think is what I would have to do, so we could keep the same schedule for the kids — I'd be more likely to have to do stories about the next Jodi Arias trial, or the latest viral dance craze, or the finger the little girl found deep-fried in her Original Recipe chicken in some small town in Missouri," she points out.

"Sloan, you've got the name recognition at this point that you wouldn't have to cover that," he points out.

"No, I'm married to you, so I have the protection and I wouldn't have to cover it," she says, then sighs. "I need to call Antonio's. And you need to call Charlie. Can we talk about this later?"

"Sure," he agrees easily, because he never expected to convince her in one conversation. He taps Charlie's name and waits for the ring tone.

"Donny boy," Charlie says after two rings.

"Pretty sure the song is 'Danny boy,'" he retorts.

"Are you coming in for the numbers meeting with Reese tomorrow?"

"Ten a.m., I'll be there," he says. "Listen, we're about to eat, but I wanted to let you know: I think I solved the problem at the international desk."

"I wasn't aware we had a problem at the international desk."

"Elise wanting to move isn't a problem?"

"It's all in the framing. It's a hiccup. She'll stay if we ask."

"Or you could let her move, since I found a solution."

"Which is?"

"Jim Harper called Mac today. He wants to come back to the New York bureau. I think he'll be a good fit."

"That Jim Harper?"

"His contract says two rounds abroad and he can ask to come back. We have to find a position for him at equal salary. He's on his fourth yearlong contract, so the options are we bring him back and put him to work; he sues; or he quits."

"Or he continues to wander around the fucking wilderness," Charlie says. "That's an option too."

"I'm not saying he doesn't have spectacularly fucking bad timing; I'm saying that ACN doesn't have a whole lot of options here and we might want to, I don't know, at least make it work for us."

"You brought Maggie back for 8 p.m. Did he and Maggie reconcile?" Charlie asks.

"Based on my conversations with both of them, nope. Absolutely not. I got the impression she didn't even know he was abroad."

"How did you get that impression?"

"How? Because when I had dinner with her she said her one condition was that she not have to work with Jim Harper. I said that wouldn't be a problem; he doesn't even work there anymore. She didn't know he wasn't in New York."

"He does fucking work here!"

"Not here, here," Don explains. "I thought it was semantics."

"Don, you've worked in news for almost 20 fucking years; surely you've learned that semantics always bite you in the ass?"

"Yes, but that's usually when lawyers are involved," he shrugs, even though Charlie can't see him. "Anyways, I'm not asking you to handle, or care, or even acknowledge, the middle-school cafeteria politics that are probably going to ensue. Mac will, because she can't help herself. But I need to get permission to hire a department head from you since he wouldn't just report to me."

Charlie sighs. "Fine. But I'm serious, if I so much hear a goddamn …"

"Won't happen," he promises.

"Good. I had to go through Will and Mac already. I'm too old for this," he says. "The Giants are playing the Yankees this weekend. Would you all be up for joining Nancy and I to watch the Giants get their asses kicked? Zoe is bringing her latest boyfriend and he's incapable of complete sentences."

"I'd hate for my kids to be exposed to the language and violence you and Sloan will use during this game," he says dryly. "Lemme check, alright? I'll let you know at the ratings meeting tomorrow."

"We have a restructuring meeting after that."

"And a viewer retention meeting after that," Don finishes. "Have a good one, Charlie."

He pads back into the kitchen, where Sloan is steaming vegetables and setting the table. "The pizza should be here in about 20 minutes. Do you want a salad?"

"Yeah, that sounds good."

"Great. There's kale and tomatoes and peppers in the fridge." He should have seen that coming.

"Charlie wants to know if we want to go with him and Nancy to the Giants-Yankees game this weekend," he says, as he grabs the vegetables out of the crisper.

"Only if he's comfortable crying in front of the kids," she smirks. "We have the TIME 100 thing on Saturday but Sunday's afternoon game should be good."

"Cool, I'll tell him tomorrow. Lily's babysitting Saturday night, right?" His 'I'm going to be a true artist' baby sister needed all the extra babysitting money she could get.

"Yep. Are you going into ACN tomorrow?"

"Yeah. Cristina is coming in around nine."

"You guys taking anchors to lunch yet?"

"Not yet," he sighs. Sloan, although she thinks the new job is great, is wary about the fact that, as long as there's no official new EP, he won't be getting home until almost 10 each night. "Once Will steps down I think we'll move Terri to eight o'clock, run docs and specials at nine, and then lead into Aaron at 10 for the first two weeks if we haven't found an EP to handle a rotating cast of talent."

"It sucks that Elliot won't consider 8; he'd be great at it."

"Same reason both of us don't like 8; he's got kids," he shrugs, popping a tomato into his mouth.

"If you're going to be bringing Jim back anyways you could make him EP at 8 and then he and Maggie can just have a big old screaming fight in the newsroom and then have sex in the conference room," Sloan says, pulling the broccoli out of the microwave. She tests a floret and winces at the heat.

"I do that and you're a single parent," he points out.

"Have you told Maggie that he's coming back?"

"Hell, no. I plan on doing that after she starts working for me," he says.

Sloan looks dubious. "Good luck with that one, bucko."

"You think I should call her up and say, 'Hey Maggie, remember the ex-boyfriend you never wanted to see or hear from again? And how I said you wouldn't see him if you came back to ACN? Psych!' Yeah, right." Sloan's quiet, which is never good, so he says, "What?"

"I just … You know how sometimes we tell Max, 'if you're going to act like a baby, we're going to treat you like a baby?'"

"We don't say that."

"OK, right, not in those words, but there's the thought. We'll treat him like a big kid until he starts throwing a temper tantrum, and then he gets treated like a little kid."

"Yeah? I'm not seeing your point here, Sloan."

"I'm getting there," she says. "My question is, has anyone ever actually treated Maggie like the big kid? When she was working on News Night, she got … coddled. Professionally. Personally. Everyone likes Maggie and roots for her, but she kinda got treated as the kid sister a lot of the time. And I'm not saying she rose above it. But if you set a low bar and then she meets expectations exactly, who's really to blame when she screws up?"

He cocks his head as he tries to process. He knows that Sloan has a point, to some extent. He had approached his relationship with both of them differently in part because Sloan simply demanded a different approach, demanded his A-game, and he'd never brought that with Maggie. But he had always assumed that was mostly a consequence of their vastly different personalities, backgrounds, and emotional triggers, and because Sloan matched (and outmatched) him in entirely new ways. Plus, he'd gone into the relationship with Sloan with a hell of a lot more intention than he'd ever approached any relationship. But — "Ok, A, Maggie went through some pretty bad shit, professionally and personally, while at ACN. Everyone was understandably a little … protective of her. But B, you think I should tell her, and potentially lose my senior producer for 8 o'clock? The only reason I might get home before 10 any time in the month of June?"

"I don't think you'll lose her," Sloan says. "I'm saying whenever she's at ACN, she gets managed. She doesn't need it, she doesn't deserve it, and it takes a toll on everyone. Just be upfront! Say, Jim's coming back, which we didn't expect and I'm sorry, and we trust you to be professional."

"That backfires, and I lose a senior producer and throw something back in her face."

His wife shrugs. "I just think she can handle more than people let her handle, it's all. Yes, we need to be aware of her feelings with Jim and of the accident, but honestly, there are two people that know what happened there, and neither she nor Jim are talking. And she's what, 34? For crying out loud. She's a grown woman. We were married and I was pregnant with Max when I was 34."

"Wait — ohmygod — you were thirty-four when our son was born? Wait, how did I miss that? Does that make you — shit — how old are you now? And when's your birthday? You do have a birthday, right? And do we, like, have an anniversary, that I should be aware of? Have I missed all of those over the last six years? How did I not know how old you were?" he teases.

Her jaw drops, and she lightly smacks his bicep and says, "Mean!" before tickling his side, where she knows he's actually ticklish. He tries to grab her hands and make her stop. As her laughter subsides, she reaches up and kisses the hollow of his neck. "It's your call. All I'm saying is maybe we give Maggie a little more credit here. I'm going to go get the kids cleaned up for dinner."

The meetings the next day — with Reese and Charlie and the nerds from the ratings department and the chiefs of various news desks and departments — are grim. Ratings have been stagnant for long enough that it's becoming a concern, and there aren't any real big draws at any of the primetime spots, minus Terri in D.C, and their 5-8 p.m. evening coverage, which he now oversees too, honestly isn't much better. A whole new lineup, launched in fall, makes the most sense. It'll give them splash and style and substance (well, hopefully, it will give them substance). But they've relied on Will and, to a lesser extent, Terri, for too long. Their bench is not deep, nor are the pockets, and so they're a teensy bit fucked. It's a whole new set of concerns than when he was just EP-ing.

"Cressida's been hitting it out of the park on weekends and fills, plus she's a known face as the legal correspondent. She could get the ten," Don suggests, once it's just the three of them shooting the shit.

"Not enough gravitas," Reese says.

"You mean, she's a woman," Don counters.

"Yes. Welcome to the big leagues, Donny."

"You know, I've never been called that till this past week, and I gotta say I'm not crazy about it," Don replies.

"It's true, though," Charlie says, throwing down his pen. "There's one woman right now with the cojones to move to being a sole anchor in primetime, and you're married to her."

"You know, build a studio in our apartment, and we'll talk. She wants to be home at night."

"Your salary ain't bad, and she's one of the 20 highest-paid anchors on TV, plus a stock market genius. Pretty sure you could afford a nanny to handle that."

"We actually have two already and, you know, I think that's an excellent tack to take with her and you should definitely make that the centerpiece of your argument. 'We'll pay you so you never have to see your kids again.'"

"She's seriously going to stay out of primetime? Until when? The twins leave for college?" Reese asks.

"Right now this is a schedule that works for us. We both get time with the kids, and we get to keep doing our jobs. I could see her switching to evening in a few years but she's not going to do 8 or 10 anytime soon. She's not Megyn Kelly, and she's not married to … whatever the fuck Megyn Kelly's husband is named; I've met him six times and can't ever remember his name. He's boring. He stays at home and caters whims. That's not her and that's not us," he says.

"We need a bench," Charlie says. "If we offer her dayside with a move to evenings in two years do you think she'll bite?"

He shrugs. "I don't know. It's her career. The only thing I know for sure is that she's going to end it teaching economics at Columbia. And I know that if you want her, I can't be the one to pitch her." He's beginning to understand why Sloan is so tetchy about people calling her when he doesn't pick up.

"Jesus Christ, seriously?" Reese says.

"Uh, you've met Sloan, right? If you're serious about this, take her out to goddamn lunch. We've spoken about it, but she'll shoot down an actual offer from me faster than she'll tell a Tea Party congressman off for threatening to shut down the government. And you wouldn't want her to be your anchor otherwise. If you have an offer, you can fucking take it to her."

Reese sighs. "We needed to announce a name five weeks ago. Find me a fucking list of six guys to consider for eight and for ten. I need it by Friday." He gets up and leaves.

"You know, if he started marrying women with IQs over 85, I think he'd be less of a prick," Don says.

"He's not going to be able to do that until his mother dies, because all women with IQs above 85 are intimidated by her or are too good for him," Charlie counters. Don concedes he has a point.

"I'm going to go talk to Mac about the offer to Jim," he says, getting up. "And then I'm headed out. I don't technically work here yet and I feel like I've been in this conference room for an eon."

"Just eight hours."

"I could have watched all of The Lord of the Rings in that time," he points out.

He checks Will's first, but ultimately finds Mac in her own office. He notices immediately that she's begun packing up for her move upstairs: Her desk is much neater, and most of the old clips and rundowns have been taken off the wall. A few photos usually on her desk — her and her dad; her and her nephews; her and Will; her with Sloan at their wedding — are gone. There is only one pair of shoes lounging under her desk, instead of the usual eight.

Even though he's returning to ACN, he feels like with Will and Mac both transitioning, it's the end of an era. Under their crazy, questionable leadership — because that's what it was; at the end of the day, the two of them set the tone in the newsroom — he'd had the two of the most significant relationships of his life, fallen in love, gotten married, had his first kid, gotten his best promotions, done some of his finest work as a journalist. Grown up, albeit about fifteen years too late. It's all different now.

"Hey," she says, spooked a little by his sudden presence. "I didn't realize you were still here."

"You'd be surprised at how long Reese's meetings can last."

"I don't think I can, actually," she replies. "What's up?"

"I talked to Charlie. We're going to bring Jim back as international news director, to replace Elise."

"That's fantastic. That's a perfect fit."

"Yeah. I'm going to call him today, but I figure he'll start in the beginning of July," he says, a little uneasily.

"What's wrong?"

He rolls his eyes. "Jim and Maggie …"

"I think this is great for them. It'll be good. They can heal." He can practically see the wedding bells dancing in her eyes.

"Yeah. Mac, do you remember what you said to me about sin, once?"

"Sin?"

"Yes, sin." She cocks her head, clearly drawing a blank. "You said that you felt that you can tell when we've broken one of God's laws, one of those universal laws, when we break something so badly we can't put it back together again. You then compared your relationship with Will to slavery."

"Well, that sounds very melodramatic of me."

"It was during Genoa. A melodramatic time," he says. "Listen, I'm just trying to say — Jim and Maggie. That might be them. I can see the wheels, whatever, and I'm just warning you — that might be one of those laws. I know you see them as a younger you and Will —"

"Not all of us can be you and Sloan, getting married after less than a year together."

"Yeah, it just took me four years to kiss her. Not sure we're that much smarter." He refocuses. "I'm saying, they've been through a lot, and it's kind of shitty circumstance that's throwing them back in the same room. So don't — do your thing. No … shenanigans."

"It's been four years, Don, surely they can —"

"They lost a kid, Mac. They get to do whatever they want, on their timeline."

"They lost a pregnancy."

"They'd decorated a nursery. They had a name. They lost a kid. If that … I can't even think about that, Mac. I'm just saying — don't meddle. For their sakes. Let them work it out on their own, ok? They're grown-ups."

"I believe real grown-ups call themselves adults," she says, but she's just joshing him.

"I'm just suggesting space, that's all," he says. "I'm going to call Jim in the morning. Because I'm pretty sure it's like three a.m. where he is."

"Sounds good. We'll see you guys at the gala, yeah?"

"Yeah, of course," he says, though it is not of course and he doesn't like galas or his tux, though he does love whatever the fuck Sloan wears. This year, it is shimmery and blue-y and one-shoulder-y. He takes a look at the TV. "You leading with the climate speech or Somalia tonight?"

"Climate, then Somalia, then the Abu Ghraib trials," she says. "You should get home so you can watch. Tell Sloan to tell her dad congratulations, by the way."

He pauses, makes a face. "I will?" he says, letting the question hang.

"The President appointed him head of the World Bank today. You didn't see it?"

He raises his eyebrows. Tom hadn't mentioned that when they were in California. Sloan wouldn't be too happy. "Oh. Yeah. Thanks. I will."

"Get home safe," Mac calls.

"Thanks. See you tomorrow." With that, he finally, mercifully, makes his way from AWM.


	3. Maggie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all! Happy Labor Day :) Having tomorrow off enabled me to finish this chapter pretty quickly, and I decided to post it today since there's no new episode tonight to tide us through the week. This one is super-long (my apologies!) so I'm super-thankful for everyone who reads it. I had to cover a lot of ground with Maggie, which is why it's so long. The next chapter will likely be Mac, followed by a Sloan one, though RL means it might be a while. This one is a little slow-moving, but once Jim makes his reappearance, things will definitely pick up.

And it is not particular at all,  
Just old truth dawning: there is no next-time-round.  
Unroofed scope. Knowledge-freshening wind.

-Seamus Heaney, Lightenings

Maggie

June 9

Maggie is exhausted by the move before she even gets to New York. It takes longer than anticipated to sell the Atlanta condo, and longer than anticipated to find an apartment in Manhattan, and what she gets is approximately one-third the size of her Atlanta place and costs twenty percent more. It takes longer than anticipated to pack, and longer than anticipated to break it off with Matt, the accountant she's been kind-of-sort-of seeing for six months, but with whom she has zero desire to do long distance. He doesn't either, but they linger weirdly. She blames the fact that this is not how she expected her life to be at 34.

She drives up on her own, and the Lincoln Tunnel is pure misery. While the moving guys are very nice and carry her stuff up four flights of stairs and set all her possessions down gently in the living room, she then actually has to unpack them. She briefly thinks about calling Tess, or Kendra, or Jenna, but thinks that Kendra may have left New York, Tess definitely has a brand-new baby, and god only knows when she spoke to Jenna last. She could call the Keefers or the McAvoys, but their kindness and enthusiasm would be mildly humiliating. Plus it's a Saturday and she would feel bad disrupting their weekends.

(She is absolutely not calling Jim Harper.)

(She's not even sure if he is in New York.)

(She's not sure which one she would prefer.)

So she slogs through the boxes, eventually taking a break around 7. She roots around in a suitcase, finds her backup pair of yoga pants, and heads down to pick up a pizza and a bottle of cheap wine. She brings it back and sits on her couch to eat, staring at the blank TV as she chews. She can't find cups, so she just swigs the wine from the bottle. Classy, Maggie, she chides herself.

Sunday she digs out running clothes and jogs down to Battery Park and back. She resolves to get at least the living room unpacked. After two movies on iTunes and polishing off the bottle of wine from the night before, she's about to get started when there is a knock on the door. Setting down the bottle, she moves to get the door, wondering who the hell even knows where she lives.

She swings open the door, and stares blankly at Mac and Sloan. She honestly has no idea why they are here. Surely they must have better things to do on a Saturday, particularly Sloan, who has three kids to parent. And she doesn't think the three of them qualify as friends, exactly — Mac and Sloan were best friends, obviously, but she mostly remembers her relationship with both of them as largely one-off instances where they'd gotten her out of a tough spot, mostly out of pity or compassion. They'd become closer when she was with Jim and after, but still. She wasn't sure it was friendship.

But she isn't exactly sure where her friends are — or who they even are — so she'll take this. "Hi!" she trills, smiling too broadly. "What … How did you find me?"

"You'd faxed your employment stuff into ACN and I peeked," Mac says, kissing her cheek and walking in. She's wearing a gauzy mauve top and black capris, while Sloan has on a loose, angular navy shirt with cut-out lace shoulders, flat ankle boots and muted mustard-yellow jeans. Maggie feels incredibly self-conscious in her overstretched yoga pants. "We thought you might need some help unpacking."

"Oh," Maggie says. "Yeah. Unpacking." She looks around helplessly. "I started yesterday, but … you know, these things. It's a work in progress." She looks around at the thousand boxes and runs both hands through her hair. "There are lots of things."

"What do you need help with? We are at your service," Mac beams. So they set to work, Sloan mopping up counters and organizing the kitchen, Mac hanging photos, and Maggie organizing the bedroom.

"Thanks for coming, you two, I really appreciate it," Maggie calls to them.

"We're happy to," Mac says. "Are you excited for your first day tomorrow?"

"Yeah, I think so," she says. The next few months will be crazy, managing the day-to-day of Will's final run, and assisting Don as he hunts for the elusively perfect new EP and host, but she is looking forward to it. "So what's new at ACN?" she calls.

"Don't work there, remember?" Sloan calls back.

"Don's a total gossip, though, don't lie," Mac laughs. "Most of the staff is new, I guess, though control room guys are probably the same. Jenna's still around; she's a news producer covering technology and business innovation. And Tess is the senior producer from three to five."

"She had a baby, right?" Maggie says, conversationally. She swallows, hard. "Late last year?"

There's a pause from the other room, and Mac says, a little weakly, "Yeah. Toby. He was born the week between Christmas and New Year's. They live in Greenpoint."

"That's great," Maggie says. "I'll … I'll have to stop by and meet him."

There's another long, uncomfortable pause and Sloan appears, leaning in the doorway. Mac is right behind her. "Maggie, we just wanted to talk about ...," Sloan starts.

"It's fine," Maggie smiles, shaking her shoulders in reassurance. "Really. I haven't seen Tess in a while. I'm excited that I'll be working with her again." Sloan and Mac don't look like they believe her, and — worse — they look like they pity her. "Really," she emphasizes. "Guys, it's been almost four years since I … since everything. I'm not going to break every time I see a friend with a kid. It's fine."

"We're not saying that it's not, it's just —"

"I had a miscarriage," she looks straight at them. It feels good, to say the word out loud again. She'd avoided it for so long. "It happens. It happens pretty frequently, in fact. It sucks, but it happens pretty frequently. I'm not going to avoid friends with kids. I mean, I'm in my thirties, it's going to happen," she says.

"It was a lot more than a miscarriage," Sloan says, as Mac clucks, "Goodness, Maggie, you must know that it's OK to grieve. To really grieve."

"Guys. I didn't move back to New York for you to tell me if I grieved the right way over something that happened almost four years ago," she feels weirdly hot, and defensive, and self-conscious. "Seriously. End of discussion. I mean it."

The next morning she shows up at 7:30 at ACN, taking a deep breath before she walks into the building and feeling a little like Mary Rogers. As soon as she gets to security, though, she realizes she has no idea who she's supposed to talk to. And of course she doesn't recognize the security guard. "Hi," she smiles. "I'm the new senior producer at eight o'clock. Is MacKenzie McHale or Don Keefer in?"

He snorts. "Ma'am, Don Keefer won't come in until at least 9:30."

"What about MacKenzie?"

"She know you're coming?"

"No. Well, yes, I mean, but no. She doesn't know how early I am. Can you just call her? Tell her it's Maggie?"

"Ms. McAvoy doesn't like to be disturbed between 7 and 8 a.m."

Of course she doesn't, Maggie remembers, it's her gym time. She stares at the TV, blaring ACN in the Morning, and idly watches Elliot Hirsch interview an author. Then she gets an idea. "Sir, I promise you — call dayside control and ask to patch in to Elliot. Tell him Maggie Jordan is here to fill out her paperwork, and she will walk down to his favorite deli on 35th to get him a lox bagel if he vouches for me."

The guard looks skeptical, but agrees, and is surprised at the response. "He says he thinks you're supposed to go to HR on the 42nd floor. Ask for Linda."

"Thank you," she says gratefully, sliding through the gates and heading for the elevator bank.

After a morning spent filling out her paperwork and getting her photograph taken, she finds Don's new SVP office, seventeen floors above the newsroom, and knocks gently on the door. "Hey! Welcome back," he gives her a back-clapping hug.

"It's good to be back," she says, smiling. She can't quite believe it. "Let's get started. When's the first rundown meeting?"

"In about 10 minutes. Let's head down," he says, leading her into the hallway. "By the way, do you know a word that you can build out of the letters m, t, e, e, r, w, l, with the third letter n?"

"Uh, is this a hiring exercise? I thought I had the job?"

"No, you do. Sloan and I play Scrabble on our phones and she's up by 160."

"Aren't you the one with the master's in journalism?"

"Yeah, two Ph.D.s in economics means she ain't no slouch with fancy words. The last word she played was jezebel on a triple word score, with a few crossover words, for 90 points."

"That's not technical, that's lucky. What were the letters again?" she asks as the elevator doors open.

"M, t, e, e, r, w, l, third letter N. I need it to hit the triple-word score."

"Renew?" she tries.

He plays it and grimaces. "Twenty-four points. I'm gonna have to call it a game."

"What do you get if you win?"

He looks at her and shakes his head as they disembark. "You don't want to know."

Oh. Ew. "You guys are a special kind of strange," she says, looking around the newsroom. It feels good to be home. "Do I have a desk?"

"Of course you have a desk," he makes a motion. "It's that way."

"That way?" she questions skeptically, pointing in the same direction.

"It'll be ready later in the day," he smiles. "So let's talk rundown. I'm serious when I say I don't want to have to do too much. I'm in meetings on the 44th floor most of the day most days, except for rundowns and show time. Will's vision for the show is pretty clearly defined already, but he's kind of distracted and irritable since Mac officially left last week, and he's interviewing EPs for his new show. We'll be splitting duties for the next week but then I'd like to hand it over to you as much as possible. You cool with that?"

She smiles. "Yeah."

It's a familiar feeling when she walks into the news meeting. There's eight producers, plus Will, waiting. All of the producers just look damn young. "Ladies and gentlemen, guys and gals, cats and kittens, thanks for waiting," Don says. "Before we start, I wanted to quickly introduce our new senior producer, Margaret Jordan. Maggie started working at ACN back about nine years ago and spent five years here before jumping to CNN, and I'm happy that we've got her back. She's worked on News Night with Will before, so luckily her spirit has already been broken. She'll be around to meet with you all one-on-one in the coming days, and shadowing me, but I wanted to dive right into the meeting. Andrew, what do we have on the energy deal?"

Don vanishes after the meeting, as does Will, but the youngest-looking producer, an AP with curly brown hair, says, "Your desk is over here. Don asked me to set it up yesterday."

"You're Charlotte, right?"

"Yeah. I used to go by Charlie but there's Charlie Skinner, so now I don't," she says.

"There really is only one Charlie, unfortunately," she smiles. "Do you want to go grab coffee? I want to get to know everyone, understand you all a little better, this week."

Charlotte smiles. "Sure. There's a cafe on —"

The 28th floor. Let's go."

"So you worked for ACN for five years?" Charlotte smiles.

"Yep," she nods. "I worked for my hometown paper in Minnesota for two years after school, but then decided I really wanted to be in New York. I started as an intern, became Will's assistant, and then when Mac showed up she promoted me to AP. I stayed on the production team for four years and then moved to Atlanta."

"Did you like CNN?"

"CNN is great. But Atlanta is not New York. So when Don invited me back, I said ok," she pushes the button for the elevator.

"Yeah, you know, there's a rumor, about you and Don," Charlotte says, casually. "Did you two used to date?"

"What?" she laughs. "Oh, my God," she laughs awkwardly, wondering if people could possibly think there was still something happening with them. If so, they had clearly never seen Don talk about Sloan. "In the pre-Stone Ages, when I first got to New York. It was ... on-off. We were … god, I was young. And we were legitimately terrible together. Awful. It took a while, but after we broke up, we figured out we could actually be friends and colleagues. It's so much better that way, too. He's a great, a really great, journalist and producer. Not long after our breakup, he started dating — have you met his wife, Sloan?"

"I've seen her on TV," Charlotte says.

"Well, after we broke up, he started dating Sloan. She just … this Don? The guy you know? That's all her," she smiles. "So, tell me your story. How did you end up at ACN?"

They're chatting about Charlotte's tenure as the editor in chief of the University of Michigan's student newspaper when a pair of hands covers her eyes from behind. Maggie twists to see who it is, then gasps happily. "Tess! Hey," she gives her a much longer embrace. "It's great to see you. It's been so long. Congrats, by the way. On the baby."

"Thanks," Tess smiles. "I'm glad you're back. We were so bummed we didn't really get to say goodbye."

"Yeah, it was sudden," she swallows. "And I missed everyone. I'm getting dinner with Neal tonight. How is everyone else?"

"Great. Jess and Tamara and Kendra are still around. Martin went to the Washington bureau. Gary went with Sloan to Bloomberg. Hopefully we'll see him more now that Don is back."

"Awesome. We definitely should try and arrange a reunion lunch, at some point," Maggie smiles. "The old News Night crew, everyone."

"Yeah! Don't you want to wait till Jim gets back though? Where are you guys living?"

"I'm sorry?" Maggie feels herself go even paler than she normally is.

Tess immediately recognizes that something is wrong, and trips over her words. "I'm — I thought — since Jim is coming back from the Middle East that — and you were coming back from Georgia — I figured —"

"Jim is coming back? Jim was overseas?" She would like to faint now, thank you.

"Yeah. … I was talking to Elise, on the international desk? She's moving to just work with Andrea and Matt and Caterina, and Jim's ... taking her role. And since you're coming back the same month I thought that the two of —"

"You thought we decided to come back to New York together," she puts together, and shakes her head. "No. I didn't even know he was abroad, let alone coming back. Let alone working at ACN, actually."

"Oh," Tess says. "I'm sorry. I thought … I hoped … I didn't know. I'm … yeah," Tess smiles, awkwardly.

"It's fine," she says too-brightly. She knows her voice is all strangley and high-pitched. She looks at Charlotte, who is staring at her curiously. "I have to get back to this meeting, but let's grab lunch, yeah?"

Twenty minutes later, she marches past Don's secretary into his office. "So Jim is coming back?" she asks.

Don drops what he is looking at. "Alright, in my defense, I was going to tell you that today, in the newsroom, surrounded by a lot of people. I had it planned."

She puts her hands on her hips. "Seriously?" she yells. "What? Were you were afraid I might handle it badly?" She starts pacing and yelling. "I mean, honestly, Don, I asked for one fucking thing. Do you remember that one thing?"

"You asked not to work with Jim."

"I asked not to work with Jim! And then what do you do? You fucking hire him back too? Is this some sort of … set-up? You and Sloan and Mac and Will get together over an expensive bottle of red wine and toast your fabulous lives and think, god, whose life is non-fabulous? Who can we shower with benevolence? I know! Let's try to Parent Trap Maggie!"

"Which one of you is a twin?" Don asks, confused.

"Focus!" she yells. "Did you bring me back to New York with the ulterior motive of bringing Jim and I back into contact?"

"No," he says, standing. "I asked you to come back because I'd seen what you had done at CNN and I was impressed and I needed someone at 8 p.m. A few weeks after you agreed to come produce News Night, Jim independently got into contact with Mac to see if there was a place for him stateside. His contract as a foreign producer for ACN stipulates that after two re-ups, he's allowed to request a transfer to the U.S. that we have to grant. There were two separate decisions here, Maggie, that coincidentally happened way too fucking close to one another. And I knew one would hurt you, and I'm sorry, but let me be clear: My options with Jim were either open ACN up for a lawsuit or lose Jim as a reporter and producer at ACN. Neither of those were too good, plus we had a job that actually would fit him really well."

She stops. "Does he know that I came back?"

"Yes."

"Did he know before or after he asked to come back?"

"After. It was his choice."

"You had multiple options with me too, you know. You could have let me make my choice."

"By the time he asked to come back, you had been hired and had purchased the new apartment. I didn't want to put you in a position where you felt you had to back out of a job but then were obligated to move back and job hunt. I thought that would be worse. If it was a better option, you still have it, though I would prefer you stayed on and worked here. I am sorry, if that's worth anything. It shouldn't be, but I am. But you have a choice now."

She gets that it's a tough spot for Don, and she's slightly mollified by his apology. But still.

"You're the twins, by the way." Her tone and inflection are lighter, and Don visibly relaxes.

"What?"

"You're the twins. You're Hayley Mills, or Lindsey Lohan. I'm the mom. Or the dad, but mom would obviously make more sense, don't you think?"

"Maggie, I could not fucking care less," he says, rolling his eyes but smiling. "Are you good to stay on?"

"I'm not happy about it, that's for sure," she sighs. "When does he start?"

"Around the first of the month."

"Great," she says, her voice rueful. "Can't wait."

"He'll be on a different floor."

"I liked it better when he was on a different continent, personally," she sighs again, and runs a hand through her hair. "Anyways. We do need to talk about the permanent EP and the anchor. Are you and Charlie talking to anyone yet?"

"We took Michael Brown and Cal Levitt out to lunch this week. Cal seems more interested."

"Yeah, but the most anchoring he's done is what, a year at a weekend desk?"

"And subbing at NBC. I know him; he's a good guy. He could get it done."

"He's awfully young."

"He's got charisma. He's good to production staff, too. Considerate."

"What do their focus group numbers look like?"

"We're doing tracking on them both this week."

"Too bad Sloan won't come back. You two could be, like, a primetime power couple."

He shrugs. "It works for us if I don't start my day till nine or nine-thirty, and then work late, and she starts early and ends early. Plus, she would rather just focus on economics with some politics and IR on the side. And daytime gives her a good schedule on semesters where she wants to teach."

"She doesn't want to, or she's telling you she doesn't want to?"

His jaw twitches. "If Sloan wanted to do primetime, she knows she could tell me."

"I'm just saying -"

"I know what you're saying. It's pretty fucking presumptuous. I know my wife, alright?"

"So Cal Levitt it is?"

"Depends on the numbers and the cost."

"What about Elliot?"

"I'll take it under consideration," he says, in a voice that says he absolutely won't be considering it. "How is today's show shaping up?"

"The president's trip to Russia is going to be the lead story, 2020 candidates making the trek to Iowa, and Capitol Hill obstructionism on the student-loan reup."

"Where's Somalia?"

"Mentioned in the teaser but top of the B."

"Swap it with the Iowa story; we don't need to be fueling the next presidential cycle yet. Let's go talk to the graphics department. They've gotta be updated on where we are."

The rest of the day is a lesson in the seventy-three thousand things that a senior producer or an EP is expected to do on a daily basis. Somehow, Don manages to show her everything in between of a series of mysterious, exhausting-sounding meetings. She headsets up for the show, but it's all Don and Will: They've been working together long enough that, even if Don isn't Mac, there's a huge level of trust. So far from those 13 weeks when Don EP-ed years ago. As she's heading out for the night, she makes sure to thank all the junior producers.

"Margaret," Will calls through the newsroom, surprising her a little. She'd assumed he had already left, to go home to Mac. Don had had his coat on starting in the F-block and had disappeared by the time the credit music stopped.

"Hey. I didn't know you were still here," she says, slipping into his office.

"I like to decompress before taking off," he says, holding up a cigarette.

"Is your smoke detector still 'broken'?" she asks, gesturing toward the ceiling.

"Yeah, you know, I just keep forgetting to put in that maintenance request," he rolls his eyes. "Can't an old man have one vice?"

"An old man can. Not so sure about a new father, though."

"If I promise to buy a patch before she arrives, will you let it drop? God, all you women are the same."

"How dare we care about your health," she says. "Good show tonight."

"It was." He flicks ash into the tray. "You did good."

"Thanks. This is a good staff."

He smiles, chortles a little, and says, "How was your first day back?"

"Good, I thought. How did the show run?"

"Ran well. You like the kids?"

"Yeah. Everyone seems pretty nice … Competent."

"They're young."

"So were we, once."

"You're still young."

"Not that young," she straightens. "I was going to go meet Neal for dinner, and I'm a little late, so I should probably …"

"Of course," he says. He looks like he doesn't want to say anything, but he finally relents. "Mac told me that Jim is coming back stateside."

"Yeah, seems like everyone got told before I did," she chirps.

"I didn't say it was fair, but —"

"It was shitty timing. I know. Don's explained it."

He stares at her for a while, then says. "Well, at any rate, Mac's very happy to have you back in New York. She wants to know if you want to come to a painting party this Saturday."

"A painting party?"

"We … have to finish the bedroom. It's not painted yet, so Mac wants people to come over and, you know … paint."

"Will there be pizza?"

"Pizza?"

"You give pizza to people that help you do house crap."

"Oh. Sure, if you want pizza, I'll buy you pizza."

"Pepperoni, if you can," she says. "Mac's the only one happy at my return?"

He smiles, one of those enigmatic, deadly serious Will smiles. "It's good to have you home, Maggie."

She smiles, too. "Good night, Will."

When she gets outside of the building, Neal is waiting for her. "Oh, my god," she says. "I thought we were meeting at the diner?"

"We were. And then Tess called to say she'd told you about Jim. So I decided, fuck the diner, let's go somewhere with real drinks." She grins.

Three sake bombs, two shots of sake and one glass of wine later, she interrupts, "Have you heard from Jim? Do you know why he decided to come back now? When did he … When did he even leave New York?" She tries to keep her chuckle in the "my life is ironic" territory and to the right of the "I'm unhinged and crazy" line.

He shakes his head, flips a piece of sushi and rolls it, like a wheel, around his plate. "Nope. He left about a week after you did and I don't think anyone's seen him in person since. What happened, with the two of you?"

She sighs and dunks a chunk of maki into soy sauce. She's quiet, for a long, long moment. She's never really discussed the end of the relationship, hell, the implosion of her entire life, with anyone. There's just … nothing really to say. Finally, she says, "After … everything, after I got out of the hospital, we just … we could barely be in the same room. I was depressed, he felt … guilty, and we just … we couldn't talk. About any of it. Then one night I found out that he met Hallie, his ex, you remember Hallie?" Neal nods. "I found out he met Hallie after work, and we just … We had a big fight. I don't think … I don't think anything happened, I really don't. They just met for a drink. But we had one of those fights where you," she flashes back, momentarily, to the things she said and the things he said, "one of those fights you can't walk back from. He stormed out. I kind of get the feeling he crashed at Mac's or Don's, but I don't know why. Neither of them have ever said anything."

"He crashed at my place, actually."

"Oh," she says, struck. "How … How was he?"

"Incoherent," Neal says. "He called me from a bar, I picked him up, brought him home. He threw up, cried a little, and then slept it off."

"Oh. I didn't … I didn't know that," she brushes hair out of her eyes. "Thanks … Thanks for that. For taking care of him."

"Of course," he says. "I would have done the same for you, you know."

"I — Thanks. I know, but thanks," she smiles. "Anyways, I woke up the next morning and I just felt there was absolutely nothing left for me in New York. It was just this … I can't even … After the accident, and the baby, and that, the only thing I wanted was to be out of New York. It was just so clear, you know? Down to my bones. So I called up Amy Anderson, and she had something at CNN, so I went down to interview and … Yeah. That was it," she tries to smile, but it is painful and she thinks it probably looks more like a grimace. She takes a sip of the beer again and mentally composes herself. "And now four years later, I am back, and so is he, and I'm surrounded by toddlers. Because … God has a sense of humor," she raises a glass as a toast, which Neal doesn't respond to. She sets her glass down. "So. That's what happened."

"Did you ever talk about it?"

"No, there was nothing left to say," she runs a hand through her hair then leans on her elbow. "Anyways. Mariah. Where's she work?"

It's a crap-tastically busy week: Don is out hustling new anchors most days, leaving her to deal with, well, everything. There's a volcanic eruption in Italy and wildfires in California kill seven and nearly shut down the city of San Francisco, and Terri's team in D.C. is still high-maintenance and Aaron, the new 10 o'clock, keeps pestering her because he wants to be moved to eight. By Thursday, Don has handed the reins completely over to her, and it's a pretty fucking awesome feeling to steer the ship herself. She feels competent, confident. Empowered. Charlotte and Rachel, one of the other associate producers, both ask her for career advice over coffee Friday morning.

Of course, at the same time, her apartment is still a hot, unpacked mess, and she ends most evenings on the couch with a bottle of red. She sleeps only three or four hours a night, brings home piles of work to review, and inevitably ends up googling Jim around 2 or 3 in the morning. She finds frustratingly little — he has not updated his Facebook page in over three years. When that doesn't work, she goes on runs through the city at ridiculously early hours, and then goes into work at six in the morning.

On Saturday afternoon, as promised, she shows at Will and Mac's Midtown apartment. It's new, but shiny and sleek and TV-filled in a way that instantly recalls both of their previous apartments. She tries to imagine a three-year-old girl toddling around and she can't.

"Wonderful, we're so glad to have you," Mac says, kissing her cheek as she enters.

"No problem. I brought beer, since Will promised pizza," she holds up the six-pack. "I like the new place."

"Thanks. We wanted more room and to be closer to the studio, but I'm afraid it's not very kid-friendly yet," Mac says. "Don and Sloan are coming, they should be here soon."

"No, we're here," Sloan says, as they exit the elevator. "We're all here, in fact." She turns to see what Sloan means: Don has Max by the hand, while Sloan is pushing a double stroller.

"Oh no! I thought Aunt Lily was going to babysit?" Mac says, as Max bounds into her arms. "Not that I'm upset at seeing these dears, of course." She plants a big kiss on him. He looks freaking adorable: a blue polo shirt, a fishing hat, orange cargo shorts and Converse.

"Aunt Lily has to serve people coffee," Max says, jumping down. "So Mama and Daddy brought us and movies." He pulls something, presumably a DVD, out of Sloan's bag and runs away, yelling "Will! I'm here to visit you!"

"Lily got called into a shift at the coffee shop, somebody didn't show up," Don explains, setting down three huge bags. Maggie wonders who the hell Aunt Lily is.

"Surely you two pay more for an afternoon of babysitting than some eco-friendly independent coffeehouse in Red Hook."

"Oh, we do," Sloan says, a grim smile on her face. "But that doesn't matter when you're sleeping with your manager. That falls under other goods and services which frankly, we're not going to provide."

"It's tough being twenty-two," Don tries, albeit pretty half-heartedly, as he unstraps Twin One and hands her to Sloan.

"No, it's tough trying to live your Hannah Horvath phase," Sloan says, setting the girl down. She's a gorgeous, smiling baby, slightly more Sloan than Don, but with fine, medium-brown hair twisted into two braids and clipped with yellow barrettes, fair skin, and light green eyes. She's wearing a pale yellow, collared sundress with pastel macaron cookies dancing all over it, dusty pink leather flats, and a teal cardigan.

"I'm afraid I don't know who that is," Mac says.

"That's a good thing," Sloan smiles. "Annie, wait a sec," she directs at her daughter, who had begun to toddle off after her brother. So that must be Susannah. Don unstraps the second, who has to be Emerson, from the stroller. Emerson looks almost exactly like Sloan — hazel eyes and tan coloring and all — though with slightly less angular features, and she does have Don's nose and (maybe) chin. Her curly, brown-black hair is twisted up in two tiny, puffy ponytails, and she's glammed up compared to the princessiness of her twin: She's wearing hot-purple leggings and a black tank with white dalmation spots, blue jelly sandals and lime green barrettes. "The girls need to go down for a nap. Is it OK if we put them in the guest room then?"

"Absolutely," Mac says.

"No," Emerson says, clearly. "No nap."

Sloan stares at her daughter, snorts, and exchanges a quick look with Don. Silently, the two of them play two hands of 'Rock, Paper, Scissors,' which Sloan loses in straight sets. Don gloats quietly as Sloan turns to the toddler. "Em, let's go for some quiet time. You, Annie, and I will read some books first."

"No," Emerson repeats.

"I have Pigeon," Sloan says. It's extraordinary, really, to watch Sloan. She's not changing her tone or using baby-talk or talking down to the toddler in any way — she's still so Sloan — but she's got the hang of it. She's a mom.

"Piggie?" Emerson asks, clearly reconsidering.

"Got that too." Sloan pulls both books out and Emerson claps. Seizing an opportunity, she scoops Emerson onto one hip. Don helps her get Susannah situated on the other hip, and she sashays down the hall.

"So we actually need to put Max down for two hours too or he'll be a beast at bedtime," Don says sheepishly.

"I feel like a hostel," Mac remarks, but Don just shrugs and heads into the living room. "You want to help me finish setting up the bedroom for painting? It's down this way."

"Sure," Maggie says. "What color - what color did you go with?"

"We eventually settled on yellow," MacKenzie says, pushing open the door to a large, very clean room, with baseboards mostly taped up and paint cans nestled on old sheets. "Easy to paint over if it's not popular." She stares at the wall critically. "I'm not quite sure what I'm doing, here."

Maggie pops open a paint can and inspects the pale lemon chiffon. It's far too close to the shade she and Jim had picked out, though she doubts Mac ever knew that. She takes a deep breath."This is a good color."

"I thought, since the room was sunny, you know. Yellow."

"Alright, what do we got?" Sloan says, coming in behind them and stopping when she sees the empty room. "Tell me you're buying furniture." Maggie notices for the first time that Sloan's chambray shirt and hunter-green jeans are probably not the best painting clothes. Actually, Mac's clothes look dry-clean only, too. And actually, she's wearing the only pair of jeans she owns that cost more than $68. She wonders how this will go down.

"Of course we are," Will growls, as he and Don enter. Both of them are in flannel shirts over T-shirts, so she suspects they'll be doing the bulk of the painting. "It's arriving tomorrow."

"Good. Don't try to set it up yourself. Learn from our mistakes," Sloa replies.

"That was because someone was too busy correcting discrepancies between the English and Japanese instructions to, you know, read the English ones out loud!"

"What's the difference between a Phillips' head and standard screwdriver, Bob Vila?" Sloan smirks. "I'm not saying I'm much better. Though I do know the differences between the screwdrivers, that was just an example. But a crib we built would have collapsed the minute we set a baby in it. And Will, you're many things, but you're not handy. Don't do it. No macho bullshit. Just hire someone."

"I grew up in Nebraska," Will points out.

"It's been a while, is all I'm saying," Sloan shrugs.

"Alright!" Mac says. "We've got a lot of yellow paint and not a lot of time. All the walls need at least two coats, I think. I primed them yesterday so we're good to go. Maggie, Sloan, why don't you start by taking the angled brushes and doing a line around the baseboards. Billy, you do the same thing up top on the ladder. Don and I will start with the rollers on the rest of the wall. Come on, people. Let's focus. We've got a job to do."

It takes some time to get started — there's an argument over which brushes to use, and Will critiques both Sloan's and Mac's painting technique. Max comes in twice, and Don chases him back to the couch, staying with him much longer the second time. But soon enough Will's put on some Rolling Stones, and they power through the first coat.

They take five minutes to sit on the floor and watch the paint dry, beers in hand, but get back to work quickly. They've got a rhythm going, so the second coat takes less time than the first, even though Don and Sloan have to start alternating popping in on the kids, who after they wake up start playing with toys stashed in Mac's guest room. But the walls are finally sticky-shiny with the yellow paint, and Maggie admits that it will look pretty good once there is real furniture in the room and a little girl to play in it. "Pizza time?" she asks hopefully. She's starved.

"I did promise you pepperoni," Will smiles.

Sloan checks her phone, but before she can object, Don holds up a hand and says, "No way. If someone else is paying for pizza, we're staying."

Sloan rolls her eyes, but says, "You can take the man-boy out of the frat house, but 18 years later, you can't take the frat house out of the man. Can you get the kind with broccoli on top?"

"Sloan, that does not count as pizza," Will says with an appropriate amount of disgust.

"I think the appropriate response is, 'Sure, friend whom I dragged 40 blocks downtown to spend all Saturday painting a nursery — despite the fact that I make seven figures and am perfectly capable of hiring a guy to do this job — I will buy you whatever type of pizza you desire.'" Will rolls his eyes exaggeratedly, but goes to dial. "Get a side of pasta with tomato sauce, too."

"Yes, ma'am."

"And a spinach salad."

"If the next thing you say is a request for an acai berry what-the-fuck, Sabbith, I can't even …"

"I was going to say, let's get the gigantic chocolate-chip cookies too. But an acai berry what-the-fuck also sounds tasty." Will rolls his eyes again, and starts talking with whomever is taking his order.

"Mac?" Max says from the doorway. "Can I get out the pots? Anna and I want to play."

"Sure, sweetie," she says. "How do you like the color in here? This will be Nora's room?"

"My friend Nora's come home?" he asks excitedly, turning to his dad.

"Not yet, buddy. In about … sixteen days. We can make a calendar when we get home."

"Oh, okay," he says, then turns to Maggie. "I'm sorry. I forgot you."

"He means —" Sloan jumps in quickly.

"I got it," Maggie smiles, then kneels down to Max's eye level. "That's okay. My name's Maggie. I work with your daddy and Will, and I've been friends with your mom and Mac for a long time."

"You are at ACN?"

"Yup."

"Are you talent or production?"

"I'm production. Like Mac and your dad. I work on Will's show."

"Do you want to come play with us?"

"The food's en route," Will says, hanging up the phone. "Should be here in 45 minutes. They didn't have any acai berry anything, sorry Sloan." Sloan shrugs, as if to say, it was worth a shot.

"Well, then we got some playtime," Maggie smiles at him.

"Maggie, you don't —"

"It's cool, Sloan," she says as reassurance. "Really." And that's how Maggie finds herself playing an involved cooking game with Max, who keeps getting mad when one of his two sisters starts using an upturned pot as a drum, in Mac's guest bedroom. Eight weeks ago, she would not have said this would have ever happened.

"Guys?" Sloan says from the doorframe. "I hate to interrupt, but the food is here. We need to put away the toys and wash our hands."

"Do we have to?" Max asks, picking up stuff anyways, as Emerson hands her a pot and says, "Here go."

"Yes, we do. It's dinner."

"You're a good player," Max says as he gathers the remaining objects.

She grins, despite herself. It feels like a pretty big compliment. "Thank you," she says. "You're a good player too."

"Thanks for playing with them," Sloan says as the kids run down the hallway with the pots. "You really didn't have to. They only even came today because their aunt flaked."

"No. I … I liked it. They're good kids, Sloan. And …" she hesitates. She wants to say, it's a good reminder that not every child I come into contact with dies. But while that's probably true, she knows that's harsh humor about a former colleague's child. And, to be fair, Max Keefer could die, in a freak accident, or something. It would be terrible and she would never say it out loud, but it's true. Those things happened, she knows all too well. "I don't know. It was fun. They're good kids."

"They're something, for sure," Sloan smiles, and hesitates. "You know — Maggie. I know — I'm guessing — things are probably a little … overwhelming now. With everything, and Jim coming back, which I'm sure you weren't expecting and can't be too happy about," Sloan suddenly shakes her head, clearly wondering if she's said too much. "What I'm trying to say is, that if you ever want to talk, I'm available. I'm usually not great with advice, as you know, but I'm a pretty good listener. And I buy expensive wine."

She laughs. "Thank you. I'm good — I promise — but thanks."

Sloan doesn't look like she quite believes it, but then Don yells for her and it's dinner time and it's chaotic, in a way completely different but not entirely dissimilar to a newsroom. It's a production to be managed, just like a broadcast. Being around these people again feels like starting to exercise after having avoided the gym for eight months — it's like activating muscle memory, but you have to go slowly because your body has changed and there are new machines to use. And she feels just a little bit outside her body. But it's also warm, and familiar.

Don and Sloan load their children into the strollers right after dinner, since it's late and Susannah almost fell asleep in her food. Mac and Will make her stay later and drink a beer on the terrace, the sounds of the city floating underneath them, but after a while their kindness becomes almost too unbearable, and she deftly shoots down their protests to her excuses about leaving. On her way out, she stops by the newly painted bedroom one more time. It's bathed in twilight, waiting expectantly for its occupant. Maggie blinks away memories, takes another deep breath, and leaves.


	4. Mac

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy finale week! Another chapter update, way earlier than anticipated. This takes us on a detour all the way to Pakistan, but we'll return to New York shortly, and will focus more on the work/life balance of the characters. Most of this takes place in the past — both when Jim and Mac were in Pakistan pre-NewsNight, and before the start of this story as one is also shorter (ie, more readable!) than the last one. Thanks to everyone for sticking through this. There may be some time (and some rewrites) before the last chapter. I want to get everything synced to s2, more or less.
> 
> Oh, and the thing, at the end? Had to happen. I promise. I'd love to hear people's thoughts on everything.
> 
> "Nothing was irrevocable; everything was within reach... I could make promises to myself and to other people and there would be all the time in the world to keep them. I could stay up all night and make mistakes, and none of it would count."  
> -Joan Didion

June 18

Along the long line of her career, someone — she forgets who, exactly, but it probably was a colleague or a lover or, most likely, a man who was both — had given MacKenzie Morgan McHale a camera and taught her how to use it. She would never pretend to be a talented photographer, but she was competent, for an amateur. Will certainly liked her work, and had turned a few of her photos into prints that adorned his office walls. They weren't anything fancy, mostly grays and whites. She knew she was much more adept, technically speaking, at landscapes, but taking photos of people was her favorite.

She doesn't have much these days, so her most popular subjects are by default the Keefer children. Once upon a time, though, in her heady first days abroad in Pakistan, lost and angry and confused at everything with Will and Brian, she had stumbled into photographing children playing in the streets. Cliche, she knew, perhaps even a bit paternalistic. But she liked the juxtapositions — these children were often surrounded by war and hunger and oppressed in sometimes-horrific ways, but were still joyful. They still raced in the streets and animated objects into dolls by wrapping them in blankets and shared apples as they gossiped on street curbs.

She didn't spend much time in the country — she was mostly embedded with various troops, across the border in Afghanistan, and would only fly back when something was happening. When she was in the country, she was usually in Islamabad, living in a sterile efficiency around the corner from the American embassy. The Marriott bombing hadn't happened yet, but the city was wary, dangerous and slightly edgy with unrest. It was as itchy and ill-tempered as she was, and she simply couldn't handle her father's or the government's warnings. Although Jim urged her to stay close, she would go wandering the streets with only her cell phone, her thumb idly passing over the numbers it would take to dial Will, apologize, try and work things out.

On one of those sojourns, she stumbled onto a square building, surrounded by a high, chain-link fence and with two rows of windows running across it. It's shabby, but very clean. It's nondescript and she would have passed it without blinking, save for the children in the tiny yard. It's an orphanage.

She began to pass it regularly, at first just stopping to smile and then to converse in broken Urdu with the children; eventually, a young woman invited her in. Her name was Zahra, and she is slim and motherly and old and young at the same time. She cared for the children.

Mac flew in and out, but whenever she was in Islamabad, she visited the orphanage. She brought them supplies and watched them color and fantasized, briefly, about saying fuck it to everything, adopting a daughter, and going back to New York or London to raise her into a fabulously independent woman.

She dropped those thoughts almost immediately.

A few months later, at a draggy British Embassy party that she only went to because Jim wanted to flirt with a cultural attache, the U.S. deputy counsel introduced her to Ayeesha Khan, a matronly woman in her early sixties, who carried herself simply and with great dignity. She was wearing a printed cotton dress and flat, worn sandals. Her feet were cracked and her toenails yellowed. "Mrs. Khan and her husband run the largest private philanthropy in the country," Harris explained.

"Oh, that's quite wonderful," Mac said, feigning interest. She'd been attending these parties since the age of six, and knew the questions and the answers by heart. "What is it that you do?"

"Health care, mostly. We work with mothers to get prenatal care, children to get vaccines, our elders to get proper medication. Hospitals, drug-treatment centers. And orphanages, of course. We ensure that orphans are well taken care of. We oversee a network of cradles, into which parents can leave children they cannot care for."

"Oh," Mac said. "There's an orphanage, that I visit sometimes. The children are quite bright, friendly. It's in Aapbara."

"Oh, yes, that is one of ours," Mrs. Khan smiled. "What do you think of it?"

Mrs. Khan was the most interesting person at this deadly boring party, and they talked for the rest of the night, well past Jim's departure with the attache. Mrs. Khan was an obstetrician, trained in London before returning to her home country, falling in love with a businessman, and choosing to live a spartan life while investing everything they had in charity. The two of struck up an unlikely friendship, meeting for chai whenever Mac was in Islamabad.

The fleeting idea that she should adopt a child grew stronger. She could do it, she knew. She had means and money and, hell, she'd thrown away multiple shots at happiness, so this could be a fresh start. She had never wanted children, but now was terrified of dying alone, and that curdled into an unquantifiable yearn. Confronting life and death on the regular also probably has somthing to do with it. She brought it up at tea with Mrs. Khan one day, when she was recuperating after her stabbing.

Her new friend was quiet. "A child is not a talisman, something for you to take back to New York as a reminder of your time abroad," she pointed out, gesturing toward Mac's middle, thick with bandages.

"It's not that," Mac insisted, wetting her lips. "I've lived for myself for so long, and I'm probably not going to settle down with a partner. I've lost those chances. I'm not going to become a mother the typical way." She did still have time — she was 35 at the time, plenty of women conceived after 35 — but she knew with a bleak certainty that that wasn't going to happen. She didn't believe in god, exactly, but she believed in karma and paying it forward and consequences, and she knew she had to live with hers. "I can be a good mother. The child would be abandoned, and I am alone. We could keep each other company. Two drifters, off to see the world."

Mrs. Khan was quiet. "Yes. Unfortunately, though, Pakistani law prohibits children being adopted outside their religious faith, and considers all children Muslim unless proven otherwise. Even if you could get the courts to allow it — and they might, for you — there is no getting around that."

She returned to New York months later, the idea buried. She tried to keep in touch with Mrs. Khan, but truthfully, life happened. She and Will sorted their nonsense out and married in Italy, and while that was huge and life-changing and important, her mother's sudden death, at 76, was what really spun her off her axis. She and Will flew back to London, kissed cheeks, and listened to people murmur, "Maureen was a lovely woman." She sent Will back to New York, over his protestations, the day after the funeral, but stayed with her father for an extra two weeks.

She had wanted to persuade him to come to New York, but ended up just packing her mother's things and shuffling him around town. She kept pushing him, though, and on the last day, when selfish wheedling (I miss you and I love you and I want you nearby) and practical assertions (you're getting older and you'll need help) both failed, she finally asked, "aren't you scared?"

Startled, he asked, "Of what?"

"Of being alone! Of ..."

"Of what, MacKenzie? Of dying alone?" he laughs.

Yes. That is exactly it. But she couldn't verbalize it, so she just nods. It was a striking and cold fear she had never experienced before.

"My dear girl," he said, clapping his hands on her upper arms and making her feel like she was 16 again, dragging her father out of the UN General Assembly to reprimand her for smoking in the school bathrooms. "No matter where in this wide world you are, I always have you."

She headed back to New York a week later (alone, obviously), the conversation brooding on her mind. When she finally got Sloan, who was in a raggedy, hellish, hectic phase following the twins' birth, to come out to tea with her, the first thing she blurted out was, "Are you ever afraid of dying alone?"

Sloan, who looked beyond dead-eyed — honestly, nobody in that house got any sleep that first year after the twins' birth, and on top of that, Sloan had to be pert and perfect for television every day — chewed on a swizzle stick contemplatively. "Yes," she finally said, and Mac could tell she was queuing up some self-deprecation. "Because if I die alone, that means Don and the kids are dead — probably because I've killed them — or I've driven them all away. Which is definitely a pretty real possibility," she cocks her head. "I bet I could calculate the odds on that. Give me a sec."

"Sloan," Mac groaned, grabbing her friend's forearm to get her to focus. "I'm serious."

Sloan shrugged self-consciously. "I don't," she said. "Is this about your mom?"

"No. Yes. No. I don't know," Mac covered her face with her hands before looking up. "I suppose it is, at the most Freudian level."

"No, it's about your mom at all the levels. And you aren't alone. You have Will."

"Who is 13 years older than me, smokes like a chimney, considers walking to pour another beer working out, and eats like a 19-year-old frat boy. I love him, but he's going to die first, Sloan."

"I wouldn't put it past Will to live to 105 just to be a jackass, but you have tons of friends. You're the type of person who makes an impression, Mac. You won't be a hermit, if he … dies first. Can we not talk about Will dying? This is weird."

"When I was in London I tried to get my father to come back with me. He's 81, my mother died at 76, surely he hasn't much time. But he said no. And then he said that no matter where he was, he wouldn't die alone, because he has me."

Sloan looked confused. "OK? Yes, that's true. So what."

"So what if Will dies and leaves me alone? And then I die and people are sad for a day, and then they move on, because they have families and lives to attend to!"

The look of confusion on Sloan's face deepened. "Do you want kids, Kenzie? Because let me tell you, they are a lot of effort to go through in order to have someone who you presume will want to take care of you in 30 years."

"No! Yes. Maybe. I don't know!"

"Have you talked this over with Will? You know, checked, like, hey honey, I'm thinking we should have children. Don't worry, it's just for after you're dead."

"Sloan. Why did you and Don have kids?"

"A 25-hour-long flight messed up my birth control on my honeymoon."

"You're going to have to stop saying that when Max gets old enough to understand. You two were going to have a baby eventually, don't lie. I know you."

"I don't know. It was just … when we were dating, when we were talking about maybe getting married, I just thought, 'yes. I want to have children with this man.' And I had never thought that before, so we ran with it."

"That. Yes. I never had that thought. Ever. Not even with Will, not even the first time around," Mac shifted. "I never saw the need. And then, with my mother … I miss that dynamic. Already, I miss being in a mother-daughter relationship," she sighed as a shudder overtook her body. "So no, it's not about creating a new life or wondering whether this little person has my nose or Will's lips or any of that nonsense. I want to ... matter in that way to someone."

Sloan's eyes filled with tears, and she reached out to Mac. "I think you need to talk to Will."

Will had gone ashen the first time she brought it up, later that week. "Mac — I'm too old," he said. "And where would we put it?"

"We do have a few extra bedrooms. And Picasso fathered children into his eighties."

"Fathered, not parented."

"You like kids."

"I love em. You know what the best part about them is? You hand them back to their parents when you're done playing with them. Bonus points if you get them sugared up first."

She stared at him for a second, before climbing into his lap. "Listen to me, Will McAvoy," she said. "You will never, ever, be anything like your father. I know that in my bones. So don't let that factor into your thoughts on this," she kissed him softly. "I'm only telling you that once, alright?"

They had tabled it for awhile, several months really, as they produced a show and ate takeout in their underwear and slept in till eleven on the weekends and watched Sloan and Don struggle through that year with the newborn twins. But every so often, they would discuss it, lobbing hypotheticals back and forth like oranges. Are we young enough? Would we move? What would we name him or her, if there was a him or her? What if we put a nursery in ACN? Everything was still firmly in the future tense, but the feeling, the thought, of wanting an adoption was an ever-present ache that she didn't know how to treat.

Until one day when she got a call from Mrs. Khan out of the blue. "Oh, my goodness. How … how are you?" Mac asked.

"I am well," Mrs. Khan hesitated. "I know it has been far too long, but I am calling for a professional matter. You remember your orphanage, in Aapbara?"

"Of course," she said, wondering if she perhaps needed to write a check.

"Wonderful. I had hoped so. They've just had a young girl come into their care, a legal orphan. She is almost three years old. Her mother and father both died in a car accident; there are no other relatives. However, they were both Christian, which makes adopting her out quite problematic. Then I remembered my conversation with you, and I thought I would give you a call. Her name is Naureen." When Mac heard the name — so close to Maureen — she gasped. "Yes. Let me talk with my husband, but yes. Absolutely."

And that is how Mac finds herself, on a humid summer's day, setting off for Pakistan by herself, feeling a bit like this whole situation has snowballed and she never really made a decision. She and Will both made the gear-shift, agreed that if they were going to do it, they were going to do it right — promotions would get them home in time, a larger apartment would give them the space to raise her properly. Both were mutual; if anything, Will almost seems more game — more fearful, but more game — than she does.

But Mac has yet to consciously take her thoughts from a what-if to a this is life now. She spent all this time and money and effort petitioning the government to allow the adoption, and she's still not sure. She's not sure how she will feel when she gets to Islamabad, when she sees Naureen for the first time, when she takes her home. This is a person, not a baby she can train. Will Nora like her? Are she and Will equipped emotionally to become parents, to step forward in place of two dead ones that the girl likely still remembers? There are two many questions. The plan is for her to spend two weeks in Pakistan, the first week with Nora still living in the orphanage and Mac seeing her for progressively longer periods; the second with them both in the hotel and spending their days together, preparing to head home. She hopes this will ease the transition.

The first meeting is anticlimactic, really – Naureen has no idea what is going on. She's a calm toddler, with quiet wide eyes that seem to see everything and betray an old soul. Her hair is thick and chin-length, and she's got short, neat bangs cut exactly above her eyebrows. Mac wonders if the girl will get along with the boisterous Max Keefer, who is really the only age-appropriate playmate they have lined up, but whose (entirely apt) nickname is Wild Thing. Nora invites Mac to play whatever game she's playing, but Mac's hopeless at following along with her chattering in Urdu. She thinks maybe it is a tea party? When she leaves, though, the girl hugs her and clutches the soft blonde bear she'd brought.

Her visits get longer, and she's relieved to find that by the end of the week they have a patchwork way of communicating with each other. Zahra explains to Naureen that she'll be going to live with MacKenzie in a new home now, and at first Nora seems fine with that. They go back to the hotel and Skype Will, who can't understand a damn thing Nora tries to say, but his bluster and the screen distract and entertain her enough. The first night is tear-filled, and Naureen even has a few nightmares. But they make it through together, and while Mac doesn't feel like a mother, at all, she certainly feels accomplished.

On day two, she's trying to wrestle Nora out the door for some shopping when she gets an email from Jim. Mac — heard you're in Islamabad. I'm actually here for one more day. Would love to have lunch, if you're free. Nora is crying incoherently, and there is nothing more she would love than to see a familiar face.

She hasn't seen Jim in years. Shortly after he left New York in an acrimonious flurry, she had followed him to Saudi Arabia, tried to bully him back, and failed. He needed to do his own thing, and she got that. He and Maggie weren't her and Will, he'd said. The accident and the pregnancy and the grief was immensely more complicated, more sorrowful, and they needed to be apart in order to survive. She'd accepted, recognizing that the only way to ever get him back was to let him go.

Now he looks taller, but she assumes that means he's lost a bit of weight. His hair is closely cropped and he's dressed in a loose tan shirt and khakis, like what he wore when they were covering Afghanistan together. He's got a scruffy beard, which looks so startlingly old on his baby face that it makes her blink, hard. They meet at a park, so that Nora can run around in a familiar area and she can speak with Jim as they sip tea. Her face crinkles into a wide grin when she sees him.

"Jimmy," she says, hugging him tight. He fairly sinks into her. "Jimmy, Jim, Jim. I am so happy to see you."

"Good to see you too," he whispers against her neck. He pulls back, his eyes bright and haunted. "God, it's been … It's been forever."

"Well, that's going to change soon," she smiles, patting his cheek. So scruffy. "I didn't know you were in Islamabad. I'm glad I got to see you."

"Chasing one final lead. I fly out tomorrow. New York two days later." She wants to know more about what he's reporting on — maybe she can use it — but then he gestures towards the playing children. "Which one's yours?"

She scans the playground, then points to where Nora is happily making a sandcastle with another girl. "There."

"Nora, right?"

"Naureen, yeah."

"How's it going?"

"It … is," she smiles. "I can't really make a judgement on it yet. I worry about the flight home. And, you know, the rest of her life."

"Is Will getting excited to meet her?"

"I think so. It'll be better when it's not hypothetical. I think he's a little terrified, personally."

Jim shrugs. "You two pseudo-parented half the News Night crew, and we turned out great. Questionably sane, but great. You guys will do the same with her."

She cocks her head. "Not sure I did so great with any of you, actually."

He shrugged. "Well, Neal turned out alright, it sounds like. But, yeah. Some of your advice … Kind of questionable."

"'Gather ye rosebuds,' was great advice," she says, before she fully realizes what she is saying. "I mean …"

"I was talking about the time you suggested I go with you to Afghanistan and I got shot in the ass, but sure. That was questionable too," he lets out a half-chuckle.

She stares at him, plaintive. "You two are gonna be OK, you know that, right? You will be."

He shrugs. "I'm ready to come back. I guess she is too."

She nods. She is, as she always has been about this issue, strangely at a loss for words. "I think it'll be good for you two to work things out. You can't avoid problems. Sooner or later, you have to face them." She makes a tiny fist pump. "It'll be good, to work things out."

"We're adults. We've both moved on. I'm not sure how much we need to 'work out,' Mac."

"What the hell happened? Why can't you go back?"

"A lot happened, Mac."

"Yes, but that's life. A lot always happens. You're you, you're you and Maggie. You were in love with her from the moment you walked into that newsroom. You can work this out."

"No, Mac, we can't. I promise."

"It's broken, so you can fix it. It can be fixed, Jim, I promise. Not in a day or in a month — it takes time — but it can be fixed. I promise." She's lived it. She knows this.

"Mac, I'm pretty sure neither of us want it to be fixed," he says gently. "Things happened, we moved on, end of story. I need you to respect that."

"I'm not sure I can," she says stubbornly.

"You're going to have to," he says, and he waves his left hand in front of her. She's not sure how she didn't notice it before, and she's about to ask when he confirms. "I'm married now."


	5. Sloan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey ya'll! I came through on the update. Apologies on the delay on this one. This chapter has a lot of Don/Sloan, but also gives us a few answers on the Maggie-Jim situation. (Yeah, he's married. For real. And she's alive). But Mac and Jim will come back to New York next chapter, so there's lots to come.
> 
> Always so thankful for your reviews and to hear what you think! 
> 
> It's nice when grown people whisper to each other under the covers. Their ecstasy is more leaf-sigh than bray and the body is the vehicle, not the point. They reach, grown people, for something beyond, way beyond and way, way down underneath tissue. - Tony Morrison, Jazz

June 26

There are few professions, Sloan Sabbith knows, where a great day at work could turn into a shit day at work as quickly as journalism. At the end of those days, she usually goes home, pours a too-large glass of red wine, and darkly tries to convince Don (who never believes her, god bless his cute ass), that she would be better off at a university teaching tenets of economic theory to half-asleep undergrads. He just pours her more wine and kisses her when she gets too annoying to listen to.

Of course, most of those quick-to-crap days were due to horrific breaking news that made her question humanity and her chosen profession. Not because a colleague decided to share some gossip.

"Cory! Welcome back. How was the Middle East?" she says, as she gets mic'ed up.

"Great," Cory, one of their youngest and brightest, says. He was a starter on the Cornell basketball team and a Rhodes Scholar before joining their staff as an international correspondent with an avid Twitter fanbase of twentysomething girls that the office referred to as Corybots. "We got some great footage and sources for the al Shabaab story, and Mila was able to join me in Athens for a few days. We actually met a guy you used to work with — Jim Harper?"

"Of course!" she says, smiling. "I miss him. He's coming back stateside soon and I'm so excited to see him. How was he?"

"He was great. He and his wife were traveling a bit before the move back; I met him at a friend's house in Athens."

"I'm sorry, he and his what?" she stares at him, blinking.

"His wife. Alicia? They were at a party."

"His wife. Like how Mila is your wife?"

"Yeah. His wife."

"Like how I am Don's wife?"

"Yeah..."

"He's married?"

"Yeah," he stares at her, his head cocked. "Doesn't he work for your husband?"

"A lot of people do; I have trouble keeping them straight," she admits. "So let's just assume that's at play here and back up a second. Jim's married?" She knows she's interrogating him, but she can't help it. "Vows, married. Rings, married. Jim, married?"

He shrugs awkwardly. "Yeah. His wife's named Alicia, Alicia-something. She's an aide worker in Ankara? They're newlyweds — at least, my friend introduced her as his new wife."

"Cory, I don't mean to beat a dead horse, but I want to make sure you're clear: Alicia was introduced as his wife? Mila is to you as Alicia is to Jim?"

He nods. "Yeah. She was a little younger, dark-haired, sweet, I guess. Is everything okay?"

"Yeah. I mean, no, obviously, or else I wouldn't have this reaction, but yes," she smiles. "We — I — just didn't know. That's all."

"Oh. Is Jim a good friend?"

"Apparently not that good," she smiles self-deprecatingly, and they go back on the air in three. At the break at the top of the hour, she excuses herself quickly, yanking out her cell phone.

"Babe?" Don picks up on the second ring, worried. "Is everything okay?"

"Yes. Well, no. But yes, everything's fine."

"Okay...Aren't you supposed to be on the air? I have your show on and you're definitely supposed to be on the air."

"If you have my show on you know that it's Candace's segment."

"Sloan. Why are you calling?"

"Jim's paperwork. Have you taken a look at it yet?"

"Paperwork? What? No? Why would I?"

"I was just talking with Cory Nicholson, who says he was at a party with Jim and his wife in Athens last week."

"With Mila?"

"No. He and Mila were at a party with Jim Harper andJim Harper's wife."

"Jim is married?"

"Yes. Her name is Alicia, according to Cory," she looks quickly at the clock. "I've got to be back on in 30. Can you … handle this?"

"Fine," he says, quickly hanging up.

She doesn't hear back from Don the rest of the day, save for a text saying that he's going to be a little late home (again). After relieving Keiko, she loads all three of the kids and the dog up for a trip to the playground down the street, then quickly makes them some mac'n'cheese with broccoli and reheated shredded chicken for dinner. Since it's one of her versus three of them, they all end up in the bathtub post-dinner, and that's where Don finds her.

"Bathtime! Alright," he says, leaning in the doorway and leering at her a little.

"You just like that it means I'm in a tank top," she says, smirking, because it's true. She's mostly just pleasantly surprised he made it home at 7. "A little help?" she smiles.

"Daddy I got dirty!" Max smiles, standing up, and she quickly moves to seat him again before he falls. Don sheds his jacket and rolls up his sleeves, leaning over to kiss her shoulder before plopping next to her. "We went to the park and then we had mac'n'cheese and then Emmy put her face in the bowl."

"She did?" Don carefully soaps up a sponge and begins to run it over Anna, making sure to get the smudge of cheese on her nose. "Emmy, did you put your face in your bowl?"

Emma smiles broadly. "Is yummy," she explains, as Anna tosses a toy duck out of the tub.

"Susannah Claire, that's it," Sloan sighs, putting the duck on top of the toilet. "No more ducky."

"I want it," Susannah says sternly.

"Nope, you didn't follow directions," Sloan says, carefully palming some baby shampoo before running her fingers through Emerson's curls. "They're mostly soaped up, I just need to do shampoos. And, crap — their bathrobes. Can you go grab them?"

Don returns a second later with robes — a shark for Max, a strawberry for Susannah, and a ladybug for Emerson. They quickly wash their hair and wrap them up, and brush the girls' teeth while Max dresses himself and gets a last 20 minutes with his toy trains. They get the girls in pajamas and new diapers, then split so Don gets storytime with the girls, while she gives Max one last snack (goldfish) and get his teeth brushed. Then they join back up, read Max two stories, and finally turn off his lights at 8. She's exhausted, but still wants to know what's up with Jim.

Don tugs her down toward the kitchen, since she knows he is starving, as usual, and they begin to root through the kitchen. As she bites into a carrot to tide her over, she asks, "Did you get a chance to look into Jim?"

He pulls a bag of just-saute-in-oil frozen ravioli out of the freezer, and holds it up, silently asking the question. She nods. It'll have to do. He tugs it open and sighs. "You're not going to like it."

"Seriously?" she says, raising her voice as she puts it together. "He's married?"

"Officially, on ACN employment paperwork? No. But he hasn't updated those since 2010. He filed his last year's taxes by himself. His life insurance paperwork also still lists his sister as his beneficiary." It occurs to Sloan that sending him on this mission is probably illegal, and definitely an invasion of privacy, but she doesn't care. "So then, since you seemed so adamant —"

"Cory seemed adamant," she interjects.

"Right," he says. "I went into Lexis-Nexis. I found a marriage license for Jim Harper and Alicia Agrella dated January 19th, filed in Paris."

She stares at him, the carrot dangling from her hand. "You're shitting me."

"Nope," he swears.

"He fucking got married, didn't tell anyone, then asked you for a job back right after you hire Maggie, and accepts? Is he planning on bringing this … wife with him? Who is she, anyways?"

"I'm pretty sure he didn't know Maggie was coming back to New York when he asked, to be fair. Unless he knows someone at CNN and had an antenna up. But Alicia is 23, graduated from Dartmouth last year, and is an aide worker with UNHCR in Turkish refugee camps. She started that job in September."

Her jaw drops. "So they knew each other, what, four months, before they got married? At most?"

He nods. "Unless they knew each other before. Which is pretty unlikely — she was in New Hampshire, and as far as I know Jim still hates that place."

"Fuck," she says.

"Yeah."

"Fuck!"

"Yeah."

"I am going to kill him," she declares, chomping down heavily on the carrot. "And then I'm going to bring him back to life, so that Kenzie can kill him again," she stares. "Seriously, how did he think this would just stay hidden? That this didn't merit some advanced warning? Oh my god, I have to tell Kenzie." Kenzie's love for Jim was the fierce, unequivocal, and completely judgemental love of an older sister. She would not be happy.

As she goes to reach for her phone, Don gently grabs her wrist. "Can you, not, yet?" he asks. "Mac's in Pakistan, she's dealing with the adoption. Besides," he says, "he is allowed to move on. And also, weren't you all 'treat Maggie like an adult'? Isn't this, like, coddling?"

"Ok, when I said that, I also said that when she acted like a child, we should treat her like a child. He's being childish. And cagey. Plus, you know, the sisterhood."

"Ah yes. The sisterhood. Because the definition of feminism is absolutely that well-educated, empowered women can support each other in bad breakups by denouncing the guy. Charlotte York would be proud," he deadpans, pouring her a glass of wine.

"I should never have told you that," she shoots him a mock-withering glare, then sighs. He holds up his beer and she clinks it with her wine glass. She knows that Jim moving on is good, and she certainly doesn't harbor any illusions of him getting back together with Maggie (not that she's even sure that's a good idea). But — "Ignoring the fact that he's moving back and didn't tell Maggie he got married, which is pretty douchey, what about that he didn't tell us as friends? We would be supportive. Well. Everyone but Kenzie would be supportive. And she would eventually. And even if we're not friends anymore, what about you, as a boss? Like, just a head's up — hey, I'll be bringing a wife with me, we should play bridge."

Her husband sighs. "He gets to town tomorrow. I'll talk to him on Thursday. Who knows — there's definitely a precedent for the ACN crew to do low-key, spur-of-the-moment, incredibly romantic weddings that result in awesome marriages. It could just be that," he loops his hands around her waist and kisses her.

She sighs, but slides her hands under his shirt to scratch his lower back, bumping her hips against his as he runs his hands down her arms. "This is colossally bad timing."

"Yup," he laughs, kissing her lightly. "Wouldn't be Jim and Maggie drama if it wasn't." She laughs, kissing him back, more deeply, and skims her hands around to his front. Feels his stomach muscles clench involuntarily. She laughs into the kiss, because, damn. It's really nice when he gets home before ten.

"Alright, so we're leading with the Fed signaling it's lowering the interest rate, and with China's housing bubble bursting," Travis, her EP, says the next morning at their final news meeting before the show. "Sloan, you'll open the show, but then throw to Bryant for the Fed story."

"Right," she says, barely able to refrain from rolling her eyes. "Good work, people. We'll close the top of the hour with Cory and al-Shabab, and then with a teaser to the Cupertino announcement later this week." After everyone gathers their belongings and scurries off, she remarks to Travis, "You know, I thought the name was This Day With Sloan Sabbith, not Some Random Show With that One Lady and Also Bryant Carmichael."

"Sloan, it's a —"

"Conflict of interest. You've mentioned that. It's also the lead financial story on a financial network, and, oh yeah, I'm the chief financial correspondent, lead daytime anchor, and managing editor of three hours a day." Ever since her dad had taken the appointment to the Fed — "it's a favor to a friend, honey," he'd said, like it was picking up an extra jug of milk at the grocery store for the neighbor and not filling a major Congressional appointment in a pinch for the president of the entire United States — her work life had been complicated. To say the least. She'd sat down with Josh and Rowan and everyone who could possibly be considered her boss, and hammered out the terms of conflicts of interest: Anything involving the general Fed — not good. Someone else should say it. Something telegraphed or said specifically by the Fed chairman — fine, but if possible, please mention her dad.

Travis follows her into her office, where she's grabbing her jewelry and heels. "You know, it would be one thing if we were getting scoops ahead of time from him, but we're not. Or if he was making decisions independently from the rest of the Fed, but he isn't. Or if there's major breaking news or controversy. But when it's minor shit like that? It's kabuki theatre! He's filling a position for two years as a favor to the president. Most people in the world we're speaking to know he's my dad and exactly what the extent of his role is. And further, anyone who might care about the conflict of interest know that I'm the anchor and managing editor, and that anything that gets on the air goes past me. So it doesn't matter whether the words are coming out of Bryant's mouth or mine; I have a final veto on which stories reach the air. For god's sakes, I wrote his text," she pushes the back of her earring on more forcefully than she intended to, and it bites her lobe. She winces. "It's a farce. It's an unworkable stopgap and a total farce." She shoves her feet into her heels and instantly feels ultra-confident in a way that only three-inch pumps can provide.

"Sloan, what would you have us do?"

"Let me report on Fed stuff, and if there is a direct conflict with my family, trust that I've been doing this long enough and am honorable enough to say something about it. Chris Cuomo covered national politics for CNN while his brother was was competitive in presidential primaries. If he can do that, I can do this."

He hesitates. "If you want the report today, take the report today."

"It's not about this story!" she exclaims. "It's about the other eighty-two stories about the Fed we're going to run this week! And next week! This policy isn't a policy."

Gary pops his head in. "You're on in five."

She rolls her eyes. "This isn't done."

"I know," he says, with an eye-roll in his tone. She's deathly afraid of the day one of her kids figures out how to do that.

"What does that mean?" she asks, fastening her watch as she moves past him.

He stops. "All it means is that I know."

"Now this isn't done, either," she says, heading toward the chair as her assistant holds out her mic pack.

Starting a three-hour show off with a spat with the EP is never a good idea, and internally the show teeters on the rails from then on out. But she's been doing this long enough that she knows how to run a tight show while tuning out the producer, except for when he directs her to cut to commercial. She'd learned that in the old days with Don, when their individual grappling with the feelings thing and then the whole work-relationship-boundaries thing had threatened to overwhelm them with a charged, wonky vibe. Pushing other issues out of their heads and being absolutely professional was how they managed to get through a broadcast when working together, even when arguing or uncertain of what exactly they were supposed to be doing, and ultimately it had made her a better journalist.

Until they realized that him talking dirty into her ear during commercials was a way more satisfying way to deal, and ultimately had made her better at being in the relationship.

Not that that's an option here. Because, gross. On so many levels.

Rowan, the nattily-dress led president of news, watches the last five minutes of the closing panel she's moderating, on the impact that the president's foreign policy in Somalia will have on the oil market in the Middle East. She sees him and shifts, then smiles tightly.

After she's thrown it to Erica in San Francisco for Tech Talk and broken the show down with Gary and Noelle, her favorite junior producer, she walks toward Rowan, raising her eyebrows to indicate that she sees him.

"How's it goin', Rowan?" she says, rhyming the words slightly.

"Oh, you know, China's going to take over the world economy and then drag drag the entire thing down. So, peachy," he smiles. "Let's talk."

"After you," she says, as they head to the elevators. "Did you know that the fortune cookie was not actually invented in China?"

"San Francisco, 1920, if I remember correctly," he smiles at her, stopping at the cereal bar and filling a tiny bowl with grape nuts and honey-nut cheerios. He doesn't add milk. Everyone in the office knows about Rowan's food tics.

"It was also originally Japanese, not Chinese, as my mother liked to point out," she smiles, lifting an orange. Rowan leads her to his office and pushes it open with his back, then lets her walk in first. She sits in the chair opposite his, waiting patiently.

"So I heard we're unhappy with the conflict-of-interest policy," Rowan says, setting the cereal aside.

"I wouldn't say unhappy. I think frustrated is a little more apt. Or aggravated. Or — Nevermind, sorry," living with a word-nut like Don makes her extra-precise in her language. "If the policy did what it intended to do, I would be fine. Frustrated, but fine. But it doesn't. It's a porous and artificial boundary, and all it does is prohibit me from doing stories I should get, and hurts our coverage overall. It's overly cautious; cutting me out of the Fed cuts me out of basically one fifth of all the stories we cover. We're a financial network, and you're cutting me out of twenty percent of stories. Everyone watching us knows that someone who has a two-year appointment and is just a voting member doesn't really make decisions. But it does stop me from doing my job."

"Given that we are a financial network, we have a higher bar for our audience," Rowan argues back. "We're not CNN or ACN, we don't have another niche to fill. If they don't trust that we're being ethical and they leave, there's not a whole lot of people to fill their spots."

"Where would they go? CNBC? Fox Business? CNBC is slow, and tell me with a straight face you think our viewing audience would go to Fox Business."

"I don't know where they go but this seems like an unnecessary risk."

"Have numbers dropped in the last six weeks?"

"No."

"Then what's the problem?"

"You have been in this business long enough, Sloan, to know that it's not unethical behavior that brings you down. It's the appearance of unethical behavior. It's fine now but that can absolutely turn on a dime."

She stares at him, and takes a deep breath before she throws things. "Seriously? I made it through a photo scandal and was part of a team that fucking accused the government of dropping sarin gas on civilians. I'm not proud of either of those, but I weathered them. I think you need to have more faith in your fucking viewers. If you trust them and are honest with them, they'll trust you."

Rowan sighs. "I'm not saying I don't trust you, or that the viewers shouldn't trust you, but that if, god forbid, another huge financial crisis happens, on this Fed's watch, we're going to have some serious issues if your dad is one of the governors. Serious issues." She sighs too, because she knows, at the end of the day, that's the problem. "If that happens, the network's in one of the biggest clusterfucks any network has ever had to deal with, and we don't have the institutional prestige of an ACN to weather it. You're the best financial reporter in the business, Sloan. Hell, you're one of the best, period. And I want to think on it, I really do, because you're right: You should be reporting those stories. But when push comes to shove, we're here to be vigilant and informative about business and economics, and there's a line, a very thin line, that when crossed you become part of the story. And at that point we, as a network, lose our credibility. And if that happens, if we're pushed aside on the biggest financial story in a decade, then yes. Yes our viewers leave, and yes we're fucked. And you know that."

She purses her lips, because he has a point. "I still think it would be worth taking a look at what's currently a blanket ban on me saying the word Fed. I'm not saying I should be on every story but I need to be able to do my job."

"I'll think on it," he promises, then raises a hand in a 'you're free to go' gesture.'

When she gets home shortly after 5:30 that evening, she hears voices — specifically, a familiar male voice — coming from the kitchen. "Charlie," she says as she enters. "Charlie is in my kitchen." Indeed he is, sitting at the island sculpting clay with the kids. "Hi Charlie," she says.

"Hey, Sloan," he smiles. "We're sculpting. Give us a sec."

"Hey, Mrs. K," Cristina, the nanny, says. "He came by maybe 30 minutes ago, said the two of you had plans to talk? I figured, I know him, the kids know him …" She twists an eyebrow upward and hopes that she's right.

"Yeah. It's fine," she says, even though they had no such plans. "How were they today?"

"Oh, great. Emma didn't have the best nap, so she's been a little tired. Max had a good swim lesson; the instructor says he's probably ready to test to the next level. And then they all had a really great time at Group at the park. Today was musical instruments; I'll text you the photos we took."

"Mama, we played xylophones!" Max exclaims, jumping off his stool artfully. "They start with the letter 'x' and sound like tinkles and yawns. You have to hit them in the middle or they don't make the sound, though." He jumps up onto her side, and she kisses the top of his head. "And then there were ma-ra-cas!" he rolls his r's, probably like Cristina did. "Emma liked those the most."

"Shake-shake-shake," Emerson intones, making the motion with clay-globbed fingers. That's going to stain her Boden shirt. Crap.

"Adios, mis amigos. Nos vemos el Jueve," Cristina says to the kids. "Diga Keiko que dije 'konnichi-wa'."

"Adios, Cristina," they chorus back. Cristina grabs her jacket, waves to Charlie and her, and leaves.

"We're making animals," Charlie says, holding up a lion, the only recognizable shape in the bunch. Artists, her kids are not.

"Sure you are," she replies. "Can I get you anything to drink, Charlie?"

"Nope, I'm good," he says, setting down the figurine. "I just was in the neighborhood —" she snorts, since it is 5 p.m. on a Tuesday and the only way he was in the neighborhood would be if he was going senile and walked out of ACN and headed north for forty blocks, "and decided to stop by and see you. We haven't really hung out lately, Sloan, so I thought we could get lunch one day. Maybe, say, tomorrow."

"You want to get lunch tomorrow?" she asks skeptically, carefully lifting Susannah onto the counter so she can get a better look at the clay. They really should wash those hands.

"Yes."

"Who all is going to be at this lunch?"

He shrugs. "Well, me, obviously, and I was going to see how the ACN dining room works for you, so Reese might stop by as well."

She raises an eyebrow. "You want me to go to the ACN dining room for lunch with you and Reese? Just a, you know, casual lunch. Between old friends."

He nods, firm in his convictions. "Yes. Your husband works at ACN, it looks like you're just joining him for lunch." He shrugs, "A casual lunch."

She raises her eyebrow with a mix of skepticism and pity — because, really, he cannot be this dumb; he's worked in news for 50 years — as she tries to roll the clay off Anna's hands, and says, "I can't do tomorrow. And lunch is kind , since I'm in the chair from 11 to 2. I'm assuming you're both coming to Will and Kenzie's Fourth of July thing?" She's unconvinced of her friends' idea to host a 'small' Independence Day gathering to introduce everyone to a brand-new-to-America toddler, but she's being supportive best friend and fellow parent.

"Absolutely. Will's going to make those pigs in the sheets things again. Every time I have one, I just have to ponder how extraordinary they are."

"Tell Reese if he wants to talk, we'll talk there," she sighs. It's terrible timing, for Charlie to come by and start a pitch today, when she's disillusioned with her current employers. But he's an old mentor and Reese gave her her first job in TV, and she owes it to them.

"Alright," Charlie says, beginning to move toward the hall. "we will talk then."

"Where do you think you're going?" she asks.

He stops. "Back to ACN?" he tries.

"What for, exactly?"

"To do my job," he says.

"Nice try," she looks at the clock. "It's 5:45. It's officially evening and primetime programming, which is what you hired my husband for, and he'll be at the office until at least 9:30. So he can handle everything at ACN, and since you're here, you might as well help with dinner and cleaning up," she smiles. She never understood Charlie's insistence on sticking around so late every evening. It surely drove Nancy nuts.

He raises an eyebrow, sees she's not backing down, and realizes it's probably in his best interests to comply. "Alright then," he leans over to talk to Susannah, who is still covered in clay, despite Sloan's best efforts. "Let's go get you cleaned up, bug."

"I girl, not bug," Anna retorts, but follows him happily. She turns to Emerson, who is still happily massaging the clay, and picks her up. Emma shrieks. Of course.

It's an uneventful evening. Charlie doesn't complain when she serves him the same spaghetti with chunky tomato sauce and broccoli that she serves the kids, though he does pass on the all-natural organic chicken dog that she makes for Max. He plays with Max as she gets the girls ready for bed, then reads Max his stories so she can catch up on her email. After she kisses Max and ensures he's asleep, she finds him waiting in the library, a Scotch in hand, stares at the pictures ringing the television. One of eleven in the apartment. There's another drink waiting on the table.

"Scotch on a school night?" she says, but picks up the glass and takes a sip.

"Develops your constitution," Charlie replies. He nods towards the TV, where Will is telling America all about the latest action in Syria. "Maggie's doing a fine job at 8 o'clock. That was a good suggestion."

"I'm glad she's back in New York," she says simply. "How's Will doing with Mac in Pakistan?"

"He'll be happy when she's back," he says. He stares at the photos a bit longer. "You have a very good-looking family," he finally comments. "How are they? Your folks. They're in D.C. full time now, I presume?"

"Yeah," she says. They had bought a house in Georgetown two years ago, so her mom could be an assistant secretary of state, mainly overseeing issues of international law and women's issues, and so they could be closer to their grandkids, all of whom were on the East Coast. "Sometimes I think my dad took the job at the Fed just so he wouldn't get too bored." She honestly does believe that, that and when he says it was just a favor. Her dad has long been more interested in the economics of poverty and what globalization could do to elevate the conditions in the Third World. The Fed is an academic exercise for him.

"Can't be making things easy over at Bloomberg," he says casually, knocking back the rest of her drink.

She stares at him. "No," she decides out loud.

"No what?"

"No, I can't believe you actually think I would fall for this. And let's be honest, you wouldn't respect me if I did."

"I'm not asking you to fall for anything, I'm applying logic to the situation," he says. "Your network covers almost exclusively business and the economy. Your dad just muscled his way into being one of the dozen most important people in the government when it comes to economic policy. Of course I think that's made your life difficult."

She shrugs. "We've got a policy in place."

"What, that you can't cover the Fed, I'm guessing?"

She freezes. "It's the safest policy."

"Bullshit," he says. "Safest thing for you to do is move to ACN, where the economy and business is 20 percent of what we cover, versus 85. You're allowed to do more things, be involved in more stories. Run your own show about any damn thing you care about."

She cocks an eyebrow. "When are you retiring?" she asks.

He's a little taken aback but admits, "Probably eighteen months, I'm thinking. End of next year."

"Right," she nods. "Because you brought Don on for that." She's not alleging things; this is fact.

He shakes his head yes. "Nothing's set in stone, Sloan, but I like him and Reese likes him and he's smart. When he's not being an idiot, he's pretty smart."

"I know," she says, not arrogantly. "But that means, if he's head of news, he's my boss. So I go from having my hands completely tied because of my father, to being subordinate to my husband and probably subject to a conflict of interest agreement about my dad, so those 20 percent of stories wouldn't be mine anyways. No thanks. I've worked too hard for people to think that I get my jobs because of my dad or my husband. Dessert?"

"Are you an idiot, or did you just hit your head on something hard?" Charlie asks.

"Excuse me?"

"Sloan. You have been a journalist for ten years. You're either the most-watched or the second-most-watched daytime news anchor today. On Bloomberg! They can't get those numbers with anyone else. You have prizes, you give speeches, you have more than a million Twitter followers, you have two Ph.D.s, and you have been blessed with more intellect than three people combined. You've interviewed more Cabinet members than most people can name, and you work harder than a priest whose church is next to a whorehouse. Why in fuck's name do you possibly think we're hiring you because of Don?"

She smiles slightly, and downs the Scotch. "I'll see you at the Fourth of July party."

She's in bed when Don finally gets home. "Hey," he calls as he enters, heading straight into the bathroom. "How was your day?" He turns the water on.

She sighs, and sets her computer aside. "Shitty," she finally says, raising her voice a little so he can hear her. "I kinda got into it with Travis. And then Rowan. And then Charlie came to visit." She waited until he came out, because he's a little busted.

He peeks his head out of the bathroom, electric toothbrush poking out of his mouth. "Charrie kwame ower?" he slurs, then holds up a finger and ducks back into the bathroom. When he comes out, he kisses her briefly, tasting minty-fresh.

"Uh-uh, pal," she says before he tries anything frisky. "Don't pretend for a second you didn't know."

He shrugs, moves her crap before settling down. "I didn't." She stares at him until he amends his position. "I mean, I didn't know he was coming over today. I knew he was going to talk to you eventually, since our bench is thinner than a Russian model. But I told him to talk to you, not to go through me."

She nods, because she appreciates that. "Bloomberg's not going to let me report on the Fed any time soon, but I don't see how ACN would be any different. My dad's still on the board."

"We report a lot less on the economy —"

"Which is a problem and you should change that," she interjects.

"But right now it works to your advantage, because it means ACN doesn't have the dilemma of trying to balance being Wall Street watchdogs with keeping the Wall Street audience happy. Any way you move on a Fed story at Bloomberg, you're too sympathetic to one audience and that would be unacceptable to both. At ACN you're reporting facts with a disclaimer. You get to be independent because nobody cares. You're not reporting to Wall Street; you're reporting to Main street."

"ACN doesn't do enough about the economy."

"ACN did a lot more about the economy at the end of your time there than it did at the beginning. That was you."

"Because I had a show at 7 p.m."

"And I'm pretty sure they're going to offer you at least one hour, probably two," he sighs. "Twice as much time to talk about the economy."

"For a total of what, ten minutes?"

He stares at her as if she requires small words. "Pretty sure we can find you an EP that will let you do more than that. And I've heard the head of the news is a fan of yours."

She hits him. "That's what I am avoiding by being at Bloomberg!" she says. "People thinking I'm getting things because of you."

"I meant Charlie," he wheezes. "Also, ow."

"Oh," she says, a little befuddled. "Right."

"Look, for the record, the only person who wants you to come back because you're married to me is, well, me. Charlie and Reese want you back because you're damn god at the job. Now, do you want me to wear my ACN hat or my supportive-husband hat?"

"I want you to be the supportive husband, but then also give me the insider information about what they're thinking," she admits, with an upfront half-smile.

He cocks his head. "Alright, fine. Little unethical, but let's go with it. First, supportive husband. Why did you get into news?"

"To tell people what they need to know about the economy."

"Alright. And you think Bloomberg's audience has no idea what's going on when they hear the word inflation?"

"Well, no ... but that's also a good thing. It means I don't have to spend ten minutes explaining inflation."

"Alright, fine. But you got in it to help people, to hold business and government accountable, to inform the public, and I'm just asking you to really think about whether ACN or Bloomberg allows you to do that better." He cocks one eyebrow. "Also — and I'm just spitballing, this is value-judgement-free — remember how much you liked reporting on other stuff the economy affected? Politics? Drones? Terrorism? Hell, energy and transportation policy? You loved that stuff. And so I'm asking you what network gives you a better platform to talk about those issues, to balance them with the economy."

"I really, really, really like economics," she reminds him. "Like really."

"Oh, I know."

"I miss economics. Bloomberg's a good way to stay in the game."

"Have you thought about teaching again?" he asks. "Just one class?"

"When the kids are so young?" she makes a face. "I'd rather spend time with them."

"Alright, professor," he says. "What do you like about Bloomberg?"

"I like the focus on economics and business."

"We've covered that."

"I like my colleagues. No offense."

"A little taken," he says. "Pretty sure you'll like at least one guy at ACN better."

"Yeah, I heard their president of news is a silver fox with great taste in bowties," she laughs.

"You know what? I'm going to tell him you said that," he says, smug. She laughs mores. "Look, Reese and Charlie want you back. I think they want you from, like, 3 to 5 at night. And they want you to consider an option to move to primetime in a few 're in a position — which you earned — to negotiate to get a lot of what you want — editorial control, twenty minutes of numbers a day, out by five to get home, whatever. So I would think pretty seriously about it. The ACN bench is thin now, but it will fill up, and if Charlie goes through with his master retirement plan —"

"It'll be harder to negotiate in a few years since you'll have his job," she finishes for him.

"That's his plan. I doubt he's floated it by Reese," he says seriously. Don, for all his pragmatism, is one of the most superstitious people that she knows. She gives him a dubious, please don't be dumb, look. "Anyways," he says, "I would say hear them out. And then we'll talk about what's the best decision for you, for us, for the kids. But it's just an old conversation between a few friends."

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"Would you be ok with me coming back?"

He looks at her as if she's nuts. "Yeah, I would be ok with you coming back."

"It's just, you would outrank me. And one time you told Mac that the reason you didn't ask me out sooner was that you would have to be my boss sometimes -" she's completely, 100 percent, joking, but Don sometimes has trouble with deadpan, and it's fun.

"I said that, like eight years ago, once, and we worked together for four years, mostly fine!" he says indignantly.

"Right," she laughs, in a tone that indicates she's teasing, finally setting aside her email. "Alright. Thank you." She's still not convinced — there's something, deep in the pit of her stomach, that makes her feel wary, but she's in no position to articulate the discomfort to Don right now. And it drives him nuts when he can't fix a problem she's having.

She's not sure why the idea of going back to ACN makes her want to dig in her heels. She's always viewed her relationship with Don as a true partnership grounded in respect; successes and challenges are shared, decisions are made together. They have arguments, they don't see eye-to-eye on everything (or some days, even some things), but they've chosen this and they stick by decisions. She wouldn't be able to do half the things she does without him. He makes her stronger and braver; she is sure of that. And she's never felt stifled by marriage, or felt like Don impinges her independence, or like their jobs put them in competition with one another. She's always been proud to say wife, always been able to talk to Don, always has recognized how lucky she is to have this and to be loved.

But something about this makes her instinctively want to push back. Sloan's self-aware enough to know that nobody, especially not Don, can make her do anything against her will — and she knows that Don would never want her to do something or make a career move just because it was good for him. She thinks she might just be feeling a little persnickety. Maybe she just needs a few days' time to get over the arguments at work, and process whatever latent anger and annoyance she's feeling about her dad's decision.

So she moves to straddle his lap, brushes some hair out of his eyes, shakes her head to clear her mind. "Hi," she smiles. "How was your day?"

He loops his arms around her waist and pulls her closer. "Pretty good," he says. "I had lunch with Elliot, and he says he'd talk to Jeannie about taking eight. So if we have him there we can get Cal at 10, we won't be in bad shape."

"That'd be fun," she says. "He's got someone else in mind for EP, though? This wouldn't be a reunion thing."

"God, no," he chuckles. "He's thinking Mike Finley."

"So you'd be home by, like, 8? At night? Not 10 or 10:30?" she smiles, excited, and shifts against him just a little bit.

He bites back a groan, but keeps his hands on her hips. "Maybe even 7:30 some days, if I can bring stuff home," he smiles, a gentle mock in his voice. She kisses him gently. It's gentle, reassuring, familiar. It's definitely a good feeling.


	6. Jim

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! One upshot of the furlough is that I managed to write this much quicker than anticipated :) Anyways, here's Jim's POV, and a little into what's been going on in his life for the last four years. Keep in mind that JIM is the one telling the story, so he's as reliable as he wants to be. :) Even with that said, I'm not sure how well this chapter works, so would love to hear your feedback (no seriously. I really, really would. I can beg).
> 
> "Whether or not you find your own way, you're bound to find some way. If you happen to find my way, please return it, as it was lost years ago. I imagine by now it's quite rusty." - The Phantom Tollbooth

June 28

In six years working for Charlie Skinner — and by extension, Will McAvoy and Don Keefer — Jim had never developed a taste for whiskey. They'd mocked him, of course, demanded that he become a better newsman, but he had stood firm with his socially-acceptable microbrew. In fact, if someone's really asking, he secretly thinks girly drinks are great.

But his meeting with MacKenzie McAvoy drives him to ask the flight attendant for a double Scotch as soon as the second leg of his flight, from Dubai to Rome, takes off. It still tastes like soap, but makes his brain sufficiently bleary.

He wasn't quite sure what compelled him to call Mac when he found out he was going to Islamabad at the same time she was there to pick up Nora; at the time, he thought it would be easier to tell her privately. Get her to understand, prime her to like Alicia. And if she knew, his logic went, maybe she could tell everyone else, saving him a hell of a lot of awkward conversations when he got back to New York. When he'd asked for the transfer back to New York, moving back and retrofitting himself into his old circles with a wife was going to be hard enough, and that was before he'd found out that Maggie was also moving back to New York. So he had thought it might be strategically advantageous, to tell Mac away from everyone else and then have her leak it. He thought it might make things easier.

Of course, he hadn't taken into account the fact that, in New York, he could escape. Go home or to his office or wherever, if the conversation wasn't going his way. And Mac probably would have shouted less in New York, though with Mac one could never really know. In Islamabad, it was a six-hour-long, perambulatory, stop-and-start, mildly passive-aggressive question-filled argument punctuated with an occasional arm-punch and yelling.

He admits that it hadn't helped that he didn't really get a chance to tell her he was married until she was laying into him about trying to make it work out with Maggie. He could definitely work on his timing. But in retrospect he wonders if it could have gone any differently.

"The fuck, Jim?" she'd said. "The fucking fuck, man. You got married?"

He'd nodded, a small grin on his face. "Yeah. In January. In Paris."

"To whom?" she'd asked, her eyes scanning the playground as Nora, dressed in a bright yellow dress purchased in New York and costing more money than all the other playground kids' outfits combined, ran around with new friends.

"Her name's Alicia," he'd said. "She works in a refugee camp, as a teaching assistant. I met her on a story last year."

"And what, it was love at first sight?" Her voice was scornful, because Mac had only ever had difficult or meaningless relationships. "You just, I don't know, decided to get married?"

"You know, I don't know if I expected you to be happy, or even supportive, but respectful would be a good start," he'd said pointedly, scratching his beard.

"I'm sorry," she'd said. "I'm just — I'm a little surprised."

"Why, exactly?" he'd shot back. "I've been ... away from New York for four years. Maggie and I dated for one year. I've had — I've had other relationships. And we," he'd signaled between their bodies, "haven't seen each other in three years! At least admit it's not outside the realm of possibility that I moved on."

"We still talk at least twice a month and you've never so much as sneezed her name!" she'd shot back, smacking him against the arm. "Christ, Jim, if you want respectful or supportive, I'd think you'd respect me enough to tell me! I want to be happy for you but excuse me if I'm a little blindsided here." She smacked him again for good measure.

"Ow," he'd replied, annoyed, because it did hurt. "You know, just because you're tiny, doesn't mean your fists don't hurt."

"Sorry," she'd said, not sounding particularly apologetic. "I just … Why didn't you say anything?"

"Would you believe me if I said I thought you might react poorly?" he'd quipped.

"It's a bombshell, Jim," she'd said, the annoyance cresting in her voice again. She'd taken a deep breath. "So. Back to my question. Was it love at first sight?" Her voice was careful and neutral.

"I wouldn't say first sight but …," he'd smiled. Falling for Alicia had been one of the simplest things he'd ever experienced. He'd dated a few women since the breakup with Maggie, had spent plenty nights in bars losing himself and forgetting everything. But he'd emerged from a cloud, finally, about a year ago. He'd been ready. And when he met Alicia two months later, he'd felt clear-headed enough to function for the first time since leaving. She was fantastic: passionate and smart and funny and freaking gorgeous and great at her job. It was a winning, irresistible combination, and he'd wanted to make it serious and settle down with her almost immediately. He hadn't been that struck since the first time he'd seen Maggie, when he'd tripped over Mac's luggage eight years ago. "We met in September and got married in January. Her parents met us in Paris and we got married in the Place des Vosges."

"You met, you fell for her, you got married in Paris?" she had seemed stunned at the simplicity.

"Yes. Not every relationship needs to take its cues from a Bogart film," he'd swiped.

"Does she know about Maggie and the accident and Caroline?" Mac had asked pointedly.

He'd sucked in a breath, hard, because one of the unspoken post-accident rules was to not say her name. And just because he'd moved on didn't mean that it wasn't always going to make his heart pinch. "She knows enough."

"What does that mean?"

"It means it's in the past, Mac, and we moved on, and I got married, and she knows I have a past, and yes. Yes, she knows about Maggie," he'd stared straight ahead. "This is my marriage, Mac, just like how you and Will are married. I didn't get married because it sounded like something fun to do on a Tuesday. I got married because I love her."

The conversation had subsided for a bit, as they watched Nora play some more. They'd taken her to a shop selling mango popsicles. Nora and Mac were tentative, but respectful, of one another, and Nora had said, "Shukriya, Mama," when Mac had handed her the popsicle.

"So what's she like?" Mac had asked as they sat on a bench eating the popsicles.

"She called you Mama."

"She doesn't know what it means," Mac had shrugged, with a pained look on her face. "It's just something they told her to call me. I … didn't feel right making a big deal out of it. I think it's easier, if she doesn't know what it means."

"I think it's a start."

She'd ruffled his hair. "Tell me about this girl," she'd commanded.

"She's … she's great. Mac, you'd really like her. She's got this great sense of adventure, she's hilarious, she's — she's super-straightforward. Like, she calls you on your bullshit. And she's a great listener. But, she's also really happy. She's silly. She finds things … delightful. Like, she's just really optimistic. She finds the good in situations, and in people." Mac had smiled. He thought it had been over.

But nope. "I don't get it," Mac had mused, very flatly, about an hour later. "And I'm a little pissed, frankly. I feel it should be noted that I am refraining from violence."

"What don't you get?" he had practically whined. "I moved on."

"It's not that. That I get. Kind of," she had frowned shook her head, indicating, maybe not. "I don't get why you had to. And I didn't ask then, so I'm asking now."

"You don't get — are you serious? You don't get why we broke up?"

"No! I don't!" she'd said. "I'm sorry, but I really, really don't, and I just … what did I miss Jim?"

"Um, not much, I don't think?" he'd said. "You remember how Maggie was pregnant, right? And then I was driving when —"

"She lost the baby, Jim, she lost it. It was an accident. It wasn't your fault! She lost the baby and everything was shitty but it wasn't over. And then? You're both gone!"

"Yes. Nothing was ok, after the accident. And we realized … Neither of us was going to be able to get past it. So we decided to move on. It happens. All the time."

"You don't leave town because you're moving on. You leave town because you can't move on."

He had resisted the urge to bang his head against a wall, repeatedly and to the point of unconsciousness. Maybe he can get a T-shirt that says Not you and Will! He smiles, because Maggie would probably have appreciated that shirt.

"That allowed us to move on. I mean, Christ, Mac, it let me become whole — you know what, I don't have to have this argument with you. Everything worked out for you and Will, great. You infused your relationship with some sort of mythical, glittery-vampire power, and now, in retrospect, it's all just inevitable and romantic. That's not real life, Mac. That's got nothing to do with real life. Shit happens, things fall apart, people move on, and they change."

MacKenzie had been struck. "So why are you coming back to New York?"

He'd shrugged. "I'm ready to come home."

Mac had just sat back, her entire body sagging against the stoop they were sitting on.

The rest of their trip had followed in the same vein, unpleasant and awkward. When he finally gets the Scotch on the airplane, it could not have come at a better time.

Alicia is waiting for him when he gets off the plane in Rome. He still kinda feels punch-drunk every time he sees her, has since he first saw her reading a book to a Syrian refugee last fall, and this time, her hair piled on top of her hair with a scrunchie manufactured before her birth, is no different.

"Hey, husband," she says, wrapping her arms around his ribs and kissing him. "How was the last story? Is 'Gonna Fly Now' going through your head?"

"See, just when I think you've reached the pinnacle of awesomeness, you make a Rocky reference."

"Philly boys are easy to please," she says, catching his lips again. "You taste like cleaning fluid."

"I had Scotch."

"You hate Scotch."

"I do. I really, really do."

She rolls her eyes. "Alright. We've got three days in Rome, and I really want to ride a Vespa and eat my weight in gelato."

"Let's go, Audrey Hepburn."

"You know, Gregory Peck plays a reporter in that movie," she says as they grab his bag.

"Oh, I know," he grins. "How do you think any male journalism major gets laid in college?"

She laughs. "I'm going to miss you when you're in New York."

"You'll be there in a month," he says.

"Yeah, but that's a month where we could be having sex," she points out, sliding her hand into his. "A whole month. And other stuff! And honestly, Harper, much as I love having sex with you, I also really like the other stuff too."

"Well, we have to make the best of these last three days then," he says, kissing the back of her hand.

They're back at the airport in two days' time, Alicia dressed to head back to Turkey as well. "I'll see you in a month," he promises. "It'll go by in no time."

She gives him a long look. "Fine," she kisses him. "Call me when you land, ok?"

"It'll be late," he protests.

She raises her eyebrows. "Call me when you land, ok?"

"Got it," he kisses her one more time. "I love you."

She cups the side of his face. "I love you too."

It's a cramped and restless overnight flight, and he's itchy after his laptop battery dies out 150 minutes in. Once he lands he finds his hotel, crawls into bed, and doesn't wake up until 20 minutes before he's supposed to meet with Don the next morning. "Fuck," he groans, pulling on the nearest jeans, shirt, and blazer. Since he packed the bag himself, they're a little wrinkly. He grabs a taxi, and directs it to AWM. When he gets out, the sun is still way too bright. He gets out and is running into the building, when he stops suddenly, and looks up.

He's home. And it's real. He whistles lowly. Ho-boy.

He takes the elevator up to the 44th floor, smiling awkwardly at people he kind-of recognizes. He might have been working at ACN for the last four years, but he has been in this building exactly three times. He steps off the elevator, smiles at Don's assistant.

"Hi, I'm Jim Harper. I've got a meeting with Don."

"Hi!" she smiles. "It's great to meet you. I'm Cassandra. Welcome back. I've heard a lot about you."

"Just curious, what things have you heard about me?" Because if they're from Mac recently, they're probably not great.

"Good things," she smiles, and stands. He takes a tentative seat. "Don't worry. Don? Jim's here to see you," she says, poking her head in the door. Really, he can't believe Don has an assistant. Then, he hears Don mumble to send him in, and Cassandra returns. "He's ready for you."

Jim nods, trying to prep himself. He stands. "Awesome. Thanks."

Cassandra just smiles. "Happy to have you on board, Jim."

"Hey, man," Jim says, with more confidence than he feels, as he walks in. He feels Don assessing his blazer, his tie, his shirt. But he looks Don up and down too: He's got a snappy charcoal-gray suit on with a bluish shirt and no tie, because even though Don's now far enough up the ladder he's got to have the corporate look, he still fancies himself a little bit of a badass. Jim smiles, because some things don't change, and that's a good thing. Don's still got that expansive confidence that replaced the brunt of his jackassiness about seven years ago, and he looks good. The last year he lived in New York, Jim used to meet him on Saturdays for tennis, and he wonders if Don still plays.

"Hey," Don says, standing for a manly backslap. It feels good to be back. "How are you? You must be exhausted. You flew in yesterday?"

"Yeah, but I landed around 11 in the morning, so I actually got to sleep," he smiles. "How've you been? How're Sloan and the kids?" It's a surefire way to distract him.

"They're great," Don says, taking out his phone and swiping to a photo before sliding it over to Jim. Jim tilts it to get a good look at it. It's an action shot on the steps of the American Museum of Natural History — Sloan and Don are huddled together sitting down, a twin on each lap, Max standing to the side of Don, who has his arm wrapped around his hip to steady him. They're both in sunglasses and grinning wildly, but Max is sticking his tongue out at one of the twins, who's making a face back at him, and the other one is pointing at something completely off screen. He thumbs through a few more — Max grabbing the corners of his mouth and sticking out his tongue (it seems to be a favored pose), the darker-haired twin tasting a food she didn't like, the lighter-haired one shoving a flower into Sloan's nose. "The kids are good. Sloan's still kicking ass over at Bloomberg," Don says.

"They're so big," Jim observes, handing the phone back. It's crazy, how Max went from a roly-poly nugget four years ago to the lithe, athletic little boy mugging for the camera in the photos. He shakes his head.

"Yeah," Don smiles, but then stops abruptly. Jim kind of gets it — he's dealt with, accepted, reconciled, everything that happened, but since that process required a move 7,000 miles away, the people he was close to didn't really get that. And so they'll probably be a little out-of-water over the next few weeks. But he's ready. He's moved on. "They keep us on our toes," Don finally says, a little lamely, clearly wanting to move away from the topic of children. "So what about you? What's new? Do you have an apartment or do you need a couch?"

"I'm good. Happy to be back stateside," he says, wondering if Mac called and ranted truths through the phone. "I'm staying at the Hilton for a few days but then I have a month-to-month lease starting July 1 in Columbus Circle. I'll stay there until I find something a little more permanent." He'd like to find something on the Upper East by September.

"Great," Don says. "And your wife? Did she come to New York? Congrats on the wedding, by the way." His voice is affable and non-accusatory.

"Did Mac — " Jim's eyes widen, because of course.

"No — Mac? Mac knows? No. It was … Sloan. Sloan found out. One of her reporters mentioned he'd met you at a party in Greece — Cory? Cory Nicholson?"

"Oh, my god," Jim says, because of course. He remembers meeting Cory, he remembers Cory saying he worked at Bloomberg TV. "Look, I know I should have mentioned something … But it was a very private wedding, and we wanted to keep it that way … You know, like how you and Sloan did." It's a stretch, he knows.

"Yeah. Sloan and I had a wedding announcement in the New York Times the day after we got married, placed by her parents, and an e-blast from MacKenzie to 400 people. She also bought cupcakes for the entire newsroom. Then Will and Elliot announced it to about 2 million people on the air. Timothy Geithner and Hillary Clinton texted Sloan congratulations. So no, not like we did," he says gently, and studies Jim. "I meant it when I said congratulations, by the way. I think we're just a little stunned you never brought it up." He does sound sincere. He's taking it way better than Mac.

"When you say we …"

"I mean Sloan and me. We wanted to talk to you before telling anyone else. But Mac knows?"

Jim looks at him, nodding gratefully. "Yeah. I saw her in Pakistan and told her," Don waits as Jim fidgets. "Her name's Alicia. She's an aide worker working in a Syrian refugee camp. Her mom is Saudi and she grew up speaking Arabic so she's pretty good at it. We met in October when I was covering a story on her camp."

"Cool. When do we get to meet her? Is she coming back to New York?"

"Not … Not yet, no. She's got another month at the camp, then she'll be in New York for a while."

"And then she'll … go back to Turkey?"

"We're … still not sure. Her commitment to the Peace Corps is done, but she still wants to work in international issues. She'll be here for about a month, maybe two, but she's thinking she wants to go back and work in the camps again."

"But you asked for a transfer stateside?"

"I wanted to be in New York," he says simply. It's true. He'd spent four years away. His sisters' kids were growing up, his dad had had a heart scare, his mom was retiring. He missed reporting from the center of the world. He wasn't going to stay away forever. After the wedding, he'd felt … almost whole enough again, like he knew that he could move back and not be destroyed. Before that he hadn't been sure.

Don stares at him, not entirely convinced. He finally settles on asking, "Are you happy?"

"Yeah. It feels … It's good."

"That's great. I'm happy for you," he shifts, purses his lips uncomfortably. "I know I mentioned it when we spoke about the transfer, but Maggie came back to be senior producer at eight o'clock. She quit her job in Atlanta and moved back to New York to do this, because I asked her to. I didn't want her to keep punishing herself out there in the wilderness. When you asked to come back, I felt the same thing about you. And you've both told me separately that the past is in the past and everyone who's concerned about this is overreacting. So I'm gonna assume that you both can handle this and that you willhandle telling her."

"Sounds good," Jim says. He means it. He's not sure how they're going to deal with each other, but he wants to be in New York, he's not going to fuck this up.

"Now, you should probably go and update your employment file to reflect that you're married," Don smiles.

"Right. I'll be in tomorrow to meet the team," he stands. "How's she doing, by the way?" he turns in the doorway, gently rapping his knuckles against the frame.

"Maggie?"

"Yeah."

Don stares for a minute. "She's good."

"She is?" he just wants to confirm.

"Yeah. When was the last time you guys spoke?"

"When she told me she was moving to Georgia," he shrugs, because it's true. She'd disappeared for a day, woken up way ahead of him, flown to Atlanta without telling him. He'd gone to work, gone to bed alone, but found her next to him the next morning. She'd just shifted and said she wasn't coming into work, which wasn't so unusual. But instead of watching How I Met Your Mother on Netflix, she'd spent the day packing, and had been waiting for him when he got home. She'd been unemotional, two suitcases at her side, her hair pulled back and her face makeup-free. Her voice was dead. He would not forget that day. I need to do this. I can't be here, and look at you, and look at that room, and think about these things, anymore. "It's been a while."

Don throws his pen down and leans back. "OK, I'm just gonna say it," Don blurts. "What you and Maggie went through? Was hell. When I think about it, I think about my kids, I think about Sloan, and my heart just fucking stops. We all feel that way. That's why we didn't say anything when you two split for opposite ends of the world. But you've both decided to come back. And I'm happy about that, I really am. But this is it, though. You can't … You don't get to be mopey, you don't get to be passive-aggressive, you can't play fucking games with each other, you can't purposefully avoid each other, whatever. This shit hurts everyone. Especially you guys. Not in my goddamn newsroom. You need to tell her you've gotten married, and that you expect to be friends and colleagues."

"Well, colleagues, probably," he corrects. "Don't think we'll be friends anytime soon."

"Whatever," Don says. "You'll talk to her?"

"Sure," he says. "I will."

"Jim."

"I will."

It's strange, being back. He's jet-lagged, but it's way more than that. Everything in New York is basically the same, but with a twist, like he fell through the Looking Glass and didn't realize it. The color palate of New York is tinted differently than Ankara, than the Middle East, and the sun hits his eyes in strange and new ways. It's probably not an exaggeration that food tastes a little different. He's never lived on the West Side (or above Times Square) before, so he often goes in the wrong direction when he leaves the apartment.

He's not starting until the week after the Fourth, so he spends his days looking for an apartment, reading news in cafes, and skyping with Alicia. He feels a little bit like an ACN leper, so he avoids the office, Mac, Will, Don, and Sloan, in that order, since he's not sure how they feel about him right now. Even though he did nothing wrong. He still feels wary.

He supposes he should take the time to track down Maggie and have the so-I'm-married-just-FYI talk, but there's not a really good way to phrase it. He's not avoiding her, he's just … marinating. So he meets Neal for drinks instead, and lets Neal get him drunk and tell him all about how he's going to propose to Mariah, his girlfriend, and then crashes on Neal's couch.

The day before the Fourth, four days before he's starting at ACN, he gets a call from Will. "Jim," he says affably. "Heard you're back in town."

"I am. How are you? How's fatherhood?"

"I'm good. We're … adjusting," he says. "Nora's a lovely little girl. She's getting used to America, getting used to us. But we're hopeful. We're hopeful."

"That's great. I met her in Pakistan and she seems great."

"Yes. She's wonderful," Will clears his throat. "Anyways. We're having a small get-together tomorrow, a welcome to America, Fourth of July, thing. You should come. We're starting around three and going till the fireworks, I guess."

"You are?"

"Yes."

"I'm not sure Mac —"

"Mac wants you here," Will says. "She does. In fact, not coming might piss her off. And I speak from experience when I tell you that's not a good thing. You should come."

"Alright," he swallows. "I'll be there."

The next day he knocks on the door to Mac and Will's new apartment — it's on West 58th, so if the windows are angled properly they'll be able to see the fireworks over the Hudson — two six-packs of beers in hand. He's slightly surprised when Sloan, in bright red linen shorts, a sleeveless white Oxford, and gladiator sandals, opens the door. She's got the lighter-haired toddler from the photos on her hip, also thematically dressed in a blue dress dotted with white stars.

"Jim! Hi! Welcome home," she smiles, extending one arm into a hug. "Come in, come in. So good to see you. How is being back in New York?"

"It's great. Still a little jet-lagged, but great. Who is this?"

"This? Oh. This is Susannah," Sloan smiles, holding onto Susannah's wrist to make her wave. She's pretty cute, with her hair twisted back and held in place with sparkly silver clip-things shaped like stars. "She and I came early to help Mac get set up. Come on into the kitchen. You're the first here." Shit. That means nobody is here to be a witness to this, except Sloan, who is always on Mac's side, so she is no help.

Whatever nerves he has, though, Mac banishes them with a smile when he enters the kitchen. Ok.

"Hey, Jimmy," she says with a smile, hugging him tightly. It's a complete one-eighty from Pakistan. "How was your flight back?"

"It was good," he smiles, "tough getting over the jet lag. Hi Nora," he waves. The little girl, sitting at the island with a coloring book, stares at him and doesn't say anything. Alright then. "I brought beer. And do you need any help?" Sloan slides Susannah into the high chair next to Nora.

"Nope, that's what Susannah's for," Mac smiles, and the toddler begins to gnaw on the rubber spoon in her hands.

"Everything's catered. Minus the hamburgers, which Will and Don are going to grill. Since that's what men do," Sloan says, pulling a tray of deviled eggs out of the fridge. "I'll set this on the table. In the other room."

"Listen, Jim," Mac says, with a nervous smile. "I'm sorry, about what I said in Pakistan. It's been a … stressful … few months, and I guess I just got … swept up in your return and … Nora … and the new job and Maggie being back. Anyways. What I'm trying to say is that you're an adult, and you're in charge of your own life, and I love you like a brother, and I … trust you. I'm happy that you're happy, really, I am. Don has accused me of trying to 'Emma Woodhouse' your life, and while I disagree with the implied insult to one of history's greatest literary heroines, I —"

"I got it," he says. "Thank you."

"I really would like to learn more about … Alicia. At some point."

"She'll be in New York in a month. We could all grab dinner."

Her smile stays fixed in place. "Yes. That would be lovely."

There's a commotion at the door, and Don, with the second twin (Emily? No. Something hipper) strapped on him in a baby-carrier thing, comes in, Max in tow. "Mac, I won a prize at the park! We had an egg race and I won!" Max says, arms high in the air. He runs to show Nora his ribbon. "Nora, you can come too next year, when you're not so new to America."

Nora looks at the ribbon and nods. "Ok," she says. "Blue," she says, turning to Mac, who beams.

"You won a ribbon, Max?" Sloan asks. "That's awesome, bud. I'm so proud."

"Mama I carried the egg so far," he runs over and jumps in front of her. "And there was a popcorn man and we had water balloons and the big kids tied their legs together and ran all around! And we played tag."

"Sounds like a fun field day. I'm sorry I missed it," she kisses his forehead before he takes off through the apartment, calling for Will.

"Yeah. He's not going to nap at all today and he's going to be so fun come 7 p.m.," Don says, as Sloan undoes the twin. "Hi," he says to her.

"Hi," she says back, extracting the twin, who is wearing a red romper with a white chevron pattern. She kisses him lightly, and Jim notices that Don is dressed thematically as well, in blue-and-white checked shorts and a red henley. Wow. They are decked out for this thing.

Mac notices the Keefer family patriotism too and says, "Christ, Sloan, I love America more than anyone in the room and this is extreme."

"Twins are often a logistical nightmare. I get my jollies when I can and yes, sometimes that involves thematically coordinated outfits. I am not ashamed," she defends herself, setting Twin Two next to Susannah. Yup, they do look pretty ridiculous.

"Yes, and this?" Mac points to the two of them.

Sloan looks her husband up and down. "You changed! You had khakis on."

"It's the Fourth of July Sloan, the odds of us both ending up wearing red and white are kind of high," Don says, and Jim laughs.

The apartment begins to fill up quickly then, with way more people than the description 'small' can cover. Charlie and his wife and daughter, Neal and the super-kickass Mariah, Gary and his wife, Tess and her son and husband, tons of people that he recognizes from other networks and even more people he doesn't recognize. Even Reese Lansing shows up, which, the hell? He's with a blonde that Jim thinks he might have seen on TV at some point, maybe? Someone turns on the music, the beer begins flowing, people begin circulating. It's good to see people. Maybe he'll even crack out the guitar, tonight. The apartment is thick with conversation and laughter.

He's talking to Reese's date, who has the fantastically awesome name Roan (Reese is nowhere to be found, and it turns out the girl was on a Lifetime movie), when there's a knock on the door but it's tough to hear over the din.

"Do you think Mac and Will will mind if we answer the door?" he asks Roan.

She cocks her head. "Who are Mac and Will?" she asks.

Right. "I'll be right back," he says, excuse me. He moves toward the door, swings it open as the arrival knocks again, more insistently.

"Yeah, yeah," he says, swinging it open to reveal Maggie.

He's not sure why he's struck dumb by this. Of course Mac and Will invited her, of course she would stop by. He should have pieced this together hours ago. He could, after all, be legitimately described as a 'world-renowned' journalist. People in Europe know him. People in Japan know him. And the Middle East. And Australia! He's smart, and even Nancy Drew would have solved this in a heartbeat.

But nope, he's speechless. Finally — "Maggie. Hey."

She looks like she would prefer to crawl under a bed and listen to her boyfriend have sex with his ex. But she also looks good — her hair's in a stylish bob, a little darker than her natural color. It's good, it makes her eyes and face look … good. Finally, she smiles, and says, "Hi, Jim," she licks her lips. "How are you?'


	7. Maggie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! New chapter here, and we're back to Maggie's POV, though we've still got some healthy Sloan and Mac action. I'd love to know what everyone thinks: Of the three storylines (Maggie moving forward; Sloan's professional crisis; Mac's adoption), this is the one I definitely find hardest to write, and I find Maggie's voice hardest to nail down. But we definitely get a lot of background on what went down between Jim and Maggie.
> 
> A lot of this chapter weaves in and out of the previous two, though takes it a step further. I would really, really love to hear what you think!
> 
> And all the suffering that you've witnessed  
> And the hand prints on the wall  
> They remind you how it's endless  
> How endlessly you fall
> 
> -Alexi Murdoch, Breathe

June 26

"You wanted to see me?" Maggie pops her head into Don's office. She's in a good mood. Things are good. Work is good. Life is good.

"What?" Don says, slightly dazedly. He puts his cell down abruptly.

"You wanted to see me? You told Charlotte to tell me to come up and see you? Any of this ringing a bell for you, Lou Grant?"

"Oh, right. Yeah," he stands up. "I wanted to let you know I'm leaving at 7:00 tonight."

"You are?" she brightens. "For real, leaving? Not just standing outside the control room? Not watching from your office? Not pretending to leave and then circling back like you did last week?"

"Nope. Going home, with a laptop and a pound of manila folders, watching the show with a beer after I read my kid a story," he smiles. "For real. It's yours tonight. Don't fuck it up."

"Ok, boss, this is the last time I'm going to check — you sure you're sure. You trust me not to mix up the A block with the B block? Not to forget who the president is? Or gosh, what if I say we're about to intervene in Syria instead of Somalia?"

"You know, you're really not doing much for my confidence in you," he remarks. "I will take it back. I will be an Indian giver."

"You can't say that anymore," she says, mildly shocked.

"I know, but it's such a good term," he grumbles. "Anyways. Show's all yours. I'm coming to all the rundowns, though."

"Alright."

"And you need to have your cell phone at your side the whole time."

"Yes, dad," she choruses, practically skipping out. The show's all hers tonight. She's giddy. This makes her giddy.

She's smiling as she edits packages and humming as she pedeconferences through the newsroom, and milks it for humor, too. She asks Don, as he's checking on her one last time before heading home, "What's that again?" and points to the TV monitor. He shakes his head and sighs. She says, "Alright, boys and girls, cats and kittens, I'm Margaret Jordan, tonight's orchestra conductor," as she strides into the control room and sticks on her headset. "Hold the applause until the end please."

"You fuck up my show, Jordan, and not only am I never going to forgive you, but I'm going to let you dangle and get the phone call from Don," Will threatens.

Alright then. "Aye, aye," she calls. "Tim, load the graphics. Jax, is the text on the teleprompter? Angelica," she asks the senior booker, "double-check that the first guest is on standby, and Charlotte, call down to D.C. and check that Garrett's at the desk for the liveshot."

"Atta girl," Will says, just to her. She smiles.

The show nearly goes off the rails a few times, but she keeps it together. Afterwards, she gathers the dozen producers for a debrief. "Our package on intervention in Somalia was fine, but there's nothing new and we haven't had anything new in about a week. I need suggestions, tomorrow, about how we're going to find anything new. Put out feelers to the talent, your sources. We need a way in."

"Can't we just wait till the new international news guy starts? That's soon," Ethan, who she has decided is Martin-Lite (about as smart, and not as nice or pretty), points out.

"That's not for another week, from what I hear," she retorts, trying not to internally flinch. "You think Will and Don and Charlie are going to be happy with us running variations on this package for another five days? Fine, don't do anything. Also, we don't need to rely on Jim Harper for this stuff. We have talent! And we have tenacity! We can find a new angle. Right?" A few people, notably Charlotte, nods. "Right? Let me hear you!" she repeats, feeling a bit like the cheerleader she was twenty years ago. She lasted one season on JV before falling and breaking her ankle. "Come on people, let's have some pep!"

"Right," they chorus.

She sighs. "Go to Hang Chew's."

"Maggie," they all groan.

"McSweeney's! Sorry," she exclaims. There's a new bar now. "I'll see you tomorrow. I want everyone to have at least two new ideas how to pursue Somalia."

She heads back to her office, flicks through her email, watching the show again to see what she missed. There were some rocky transitions. She pauses, rewinds, times them. They can definitely do better. Aaron's ten o'clock team is wrapping up when she heads out.

She keeps herself busy over the next few days. She runs a lot — eight miles a day, usually, to the point where her body feels ropey and her joints are loose and achy and she has a headache from dehydration. She's not sure when Jim is getting back, and she's not sure what she should be thinking, or what she should say when she sees him. Mostly, it's just something that she's over and done with and past, but doesn't want to have to think about every day. After a few glasses of wine, she wonders whether she ever actually moved on, or whether she simply started over. It's a very, very deep thought.

On Friday, Neal lets it slip that Jim is definitely back in New York, and Mariah lets it slip that Jim had a wedding ring on when they saw him. He's married. She is rendered speechless for a full thirty seconds, then shrugs, and says It's his life, I'm fine. On Saturday, she runs twelve miles then goes on her first date in New York, a guy that Lisa's husband works with. He's a little younger and a relentlessly good guy, the type that holds doors and pours her wine. After the date they drift to a bar and continue drinking, and at one point, he laughs, "I am lucky — and amazed — that you are still single." He seems like he's utterly charmed by her.

"You know, that's one of those things that guys say, that they think is such a compliment," she shoots out with a fair bit of forcefulness, before she really thinks about it. At his surprised look, she continues, feeling a little self-conscious, "Well, you know, because it's like asking, 'What's your damage, Heather?' It's saying you're freaked out by the other person's singledom. Why is it a problem? Maybe I want to be single. Maybe I enjoy casual sex and revel in my ability to have it whenever, wherever. Maybe I want to take you on the table right now and not worry that my husband or boyfriend will see it." She takes a gulp of her wine, tries to pretend that it's casual. Then she says fuck it, because he still looks alarmed. "Or maybe it's because I'm bitter and cynical and bad at dealing with other people's baggage and scared of getting close to anyone because of significant dark and twisty events in my past. Do you really want to find that out on a first date? I mean, do you?" she laughs. She looks at him. "Lisa said you were a nice guy. She was right."

"Thanks?"

"That wasn't a compliment; it was a fact." She pulls out a twenty from her wallet and sets it on the table. "The truth is, the reason I'm single is all of those things I listed. I was in a long-term relationship, I was in love, we were Walter Burns and Hildy Johnson, and we were having a baby. Then when I was six months pregnant, he was driving us home from a weekend at our boss's beach house and it was raining. The car skidded, ran into oncoming traffic, and we were hit. I lost the baby and then, three weeks later, decided I could never see his face again, so I told him that he had ruined my life and I moved to Atlanta. And I haven't been able to get attached to anyone," she says these words mockingly, darkly, making air quotes with her mouth, "and so there you have it, good sir, that's why I am still single." She finishes her wine. "And that's why 'you're a nice guy' is just a statement of fact. You deserve a nice girl. I hope you find her, because I ain't it."

She finds a much dirtier, danker bar, in the not-as-cool portion of the Lower East, and hangs out there till the guitar player in the house band buys her a drink. She gives him a blow job behind the stage, and the next morning goes on a fifteen-mile run.

On Sunday afternoon, she's contemplating calling Will and Mac — Nora and Mac flew back on Friday — when Mac beats her to the punch.

"How's she doing?" she coos excitedly. "Is she adjusting?"

"She's a little disoriented right now, but we're hopeful," Mac says frankly. Maggie thinks she can hear some wailing in the background. "The Keefers are coming over; we think she'll do better when she sees kids her own age. Would you like to come for dinner?"

She's speechless for a second. "Sure. Yeah. Do you … do you want me to bring anything?"

"No, just yourself. We'll see you soon."

When she gets there, with a book for Nora and a bottle of wine for Mac, the Keefers are already there; from the looks of it, they've been there a while: the four adults are sitting around the kitchen together, carefully watching the children play in the living room. Nora and Susannah are happily using some sort of beauty-salon station that had materialized in the apartment, while Emerson and Max are coloring on oversized pieces of butcher paper. Nora's sweet-looking, with wide dark eyes and a lightweight blue dress with a button print on it. She's barefoot, with bright pink toes that Maggie suspects Mac painted.

"Oh thank you, thank you, this is all very sweet," Mac says. "She loves reading books so she'll like this very much. She's playing now, so let's not disturb with her an introduction."

"How's she doing?" Maggie asks.

"She's good, I think," Mac says. "She has some nightmares at night, and she's having trouble understanding where her friends are. But she's very well-behaved, and she's beginning to understand some English. She's very shy though — I can't tell if that's because of the new surroundings or just her personality. But she's …"

"She's a snuggler," Sloan supplies. "Total cuddle-nut."

"Cuddle-slut, even," Don says.

"Don!"

"What?" he asks Mac. "All of the kids are twenty feet away, and none of them can understand."

"Yeah, but if Max calls a girl a cuddle-slut at preschool, you're handling that teacher phone call," Sloan remarks.

"Oh. Yeah, no thanks. Cuddle-nut it is."

"That's sweet. She's shy but she's still affectionate," Mac finishes firmly.

"Is the Fourth of July thing still on?" Maggie asks.

"Of course," Mac says.

"Mac's invited an entirely reasonable number of people over," Will says, and Mac rolls her eyes.

"It's a party, people don't stay the whole time," Mac explains, annoyed, and she says, "There is one thing, though, Maggie."

"Oh dear God," Don says, rolling his eyes and getting up from his chair.

"Oh come on," Mac says. Don looks irritated at Mac, Sloan looks torn between the two of them, while Will honestly looks like he could not care less. Maggie wonders how much Will actually likes all this domesticity. "For the sake of fairness and transparency, I wanted to let you know that I would like to invite Jim. He's back; he got back on Thursday. However, I wanted to check with you first, because, well —"

"You mean because he's married? Yeah. No, I'm fine with it."

"You know?" Mac says, aghast, as Will leaves the kitchen with an eye roll.

"You knew?"

"He was in Pakistan and told me then. How did you know?"

"He had dinner with Neal and Mariah. Mariah noticed the ring," she turns to Don. "Did you know, too?"

"Oh, my god," he raises his arms in a classic I give up pose. "Yes. I'd heard. From Sloan—"

"Uh-uh, from Cory Nicholson," Sloan interrupts.

"From one of Sloan's reporters, and I wanted to make sure," Don amends. He's tense-looking, and shoots Mac another aggrieved look. "We found out accidentally, and didn't want to say anything until we were sure, we weren't withholding information —"

"It's fine," Maggie says, tiredly, because she is so tired of saying those words. "For crying out loud, please stop acting like I'm in seventh grade. I'm an adult. I can't speak for him, but if he's married he's about the closest approximation to an adult that I think he'll ever be." It's true. For all his attributes, Jim had always had a petty, childish streak, and she doubts that has changed. "Now, what are we doing for dinner?"

So it's not a surprise to her at all when Jim opens the door at the Fourth of July party. "Hi, Jim," she smiles patiently when she sees him. "How are you?"

"Good — I'm good," he says, unmoving. "How, um, how are you?"

"I'm good," she smiles. "Can I … come in?"

"Uh, yeah. Of course," he says, swinging the door wide. "How're you?"

"You asked that already," she smiles tightly.

"You're right, I did," he says, "I, uh, it's good. That you're good. Congrats on the new job, that's awesome."

"Thanks," she says. "You too. And congrats on the marriage, too."

"That … wow. Uh. Yeah."

"Neal told me," she says, trying to make it easier for him. "And I meant it. Congratulations."

"Thanks. I thought you meant it," he says. "Uh, thanks."

"I need to give these to Mac. Or Sloan," she says, lifting the platter of cookies she picked up at the Gristedes. "And then I need to find Don and Elliot to talk. Excuse me."

She finds Mac in the kitchen, Nora hooked on her hip and her face buried in Mac's shoulder. "I brought cookies," she announces.

"Wonderful!" Mac says, turning away slightly from Jane Williams. "Look, Nora, here's Maggie, you remember Maggie."

"Hey Nora," she smiles as the girl shifts her head a little to smile at Maggie.

"You can put those in the dining room-one second, Jane, I'll be right back," she smiles, taking Maggie by the arm. "Did you see Jim yet?" she hisses in an overexaggerated whisper.

"I did," Maggie says back in the same voice. "Why are we whispering?"

"Oh, shush," Mac says in a normal voice, as Nora stirs, twisting to look around. "I just wanted to make sure."

"Play Max," Nora says suddenly, very clearly. "Play Max."

"Of course, my darling, he's right here," Mac says, putting her down in front of Max, who's creating something with glue and colored macaroni and yarn with Neal.

"Come on, we're making flags!" he says, grabbing at Nora's hand.

"Alright then," Mac smiles. "I'm just saying, I'm here to make things non-awkward. I want things to be as un-awkward as possible, and personally, I still think what he did was just a douche move. I am here for you, sister." She lightly punches Maggie's shoulder.

"Yeah, this isn't awkward at all," Maggie says. "Listen. We're fine. I promise. Now. I need to talk to Don, so. Excuse me."

She chats with Elliot and Don briefly, about whom they might pair as an EP with Elliot. She resists the urge to say, I told you so to Don about this. She sees Sloan, Reese, and Charlie come out of the library, and sees Jim hovering on the edge of the party. Quite frankly, it's unnerving. Her instincts are completely confused as to how to approach this situation. Once they're done, she excuses herself, grabs a very large glass of wine (as well as a half-empty bottle for backup), and heads out to the terrace.

She lays down on a deck chair, her ankles crossed. The deck chair is just around a bend from where most of the guests are, and it's quiet. Thank god. She stares at the potted plants hanging from the glass overhang and contemplates just how badly she's fucked up her life in the last five years. Seeing Jim initially felt like ripping off a band-aid — she had steeled herself to just get it done with, to get started on their new normal. She had worried, a little, that she might see him and just instantly want to be with him again. It wasn't that. There was a tug of emotions, to be sure, and a surge of the misplaced anger that had signaled the beginning of their end. But mostly, the jolt had been from the thought of What would my life be like if I had stayed? If we had worked through it? That feeling, coupled with the stark juxtaposition of where her life is versus where she had thought her life would go, had driven her to the terrace.

After a short, indeterminate amount of time — maybe ten minutes — she hears voices, and turns slightly to see Don and Sloan headed her way.

"I'm just saying I need to think about it —"

"And I'm just saying it's solid."

"I need to consider what I want to do and what's right for me, and for us, rather than what's easy. Anyways. You should go help. Will needs you."

"Are you ok?"

"I'm fine. I'm just going to stay out here. I need some air." Maggie hears a kiss, and then Sloan turns the corner, Emerson in hand. "Maggie. Hey. I … didn't know you were out here."

"I had to get away for a sec."

"Jim?" Sloan blurts sympathetically. "Wait. I'm sorry. That was inappropriate." She settles on the adjacent chair, slides her feet toward her bottom so her body forms a V, rests Emma on her hipbones.

"What were you and Don talking about?"

She sighs. "ACN has …. started poking around to see if I wanted to return to the fold."

"Ah," Maggie says. She remembers when Sloan left, what a personal blow it was to Charlie. But she had been overwhelmed with her 7 o'clock timeslot and being able to see Max grow up; plus, she had been continually irritated that coverage of the economy and the debt-ceiling battles were accessories to the real news. "Do you?"

Sloan shifts and focuses on Emerson, clearly not wanting to have this conversation. "There's a lot to consider. I haven't come close to making a decision yet."

"Would you do primetime?"

"No, late afternoon first," she sighs. "I don't know, frankly, so I'm not prepared to discuss it."

"How do you do it?" Maggie says suddenly, thinking about all the moving parts of Sloan's life. She can barely put together a coherent grocery list, had fucked up a few major chances, and Sloan's balancing a mini-emporium at home.

"Do what?"

"All of it. Work, a family, everything. All at once," she takes a long sip of her wine.

Sloan looks at her, not disdainfully, mostly like she pities her. "I don't. At all."

"But you do! You have the career! And the … apartment! And the husband! And you two have a great marriage! And the kids! Who are adorable!" she feels her tone getting carried away with the exclamation points, so she takes a deep breath. "I mean, I get you have a nanny, but you guys just always seem so on point. You know where you're going." She doesn't verbally contrast it with herself. She doesn't have to.

"Maggie, we both work 60-hour weeks, with hours that don't line up, so that we can provide for those adorable children, who spit and puke and cry and test our patience in pretty un-adorable ways. And while we love them all, we never banked on three kids. If they all get in an argument, we're outnumbered. We're pretty sure they'll kill us in our sleep. Except for when I was on maternity leave, I don't think I've ever done a weekday morning with them. Don misses nine out of every ten bedtimes. We see each other for two hours, tops, each day, and there is always a phone or a computer nearby. I outsource everything from toilet cleaning to buying my clothes to caring for my children for most of their waking hours. I am incapable of spending twenty minutes at the store to decide which kind of milk I want, so I order it online at 2 a.m. when I can't sleep. I recognize that these are privileged problems to have. But every choice, every day, is a compromise, and I'm fully aware of how much gets traded. And most of them aren't even good compromises — what works now won't work when they're in school, and if I take this job and Don continues to pursue the jobs he wants, he'll be my boss, which means I could have my career severely curtailed. After spending 60 hours a week for ten years trying to get ahead in a job I love, I could be sidelined. And the marriage — I love him, but it's a relationship. It can change on a dime. We love each other, sure. We even like each other, still. But I'm terrified that one day I'm going to wake up and not even know him anymore," she shrugs. "But we got in this together, even though we had no clue what we were doing. So I'm taking it on faith that I know this man and I trust him and trust us to make the right decisions."

"Do you think you two could have dealt with it better?" Maggie asks bravely. "If you had had a miscarriage? Do you think you could have handled it?" Sloan's face contorts, and she hurries to clarify. "Not — I'm not wishing that you hadn't had any of your kids, who are amazing. But say tomorrow. You two had a miscarriage. Could you cope?"

"At this point? Yes. We have three kids and a dog to keep us tethered," Sloan says, a little harshly. Maggie realizes that it's an inappropriate question. She opens her mouth and shuts it, and then tries again, haltingly. "But ... We've also been together for almost seven years. If this had happened earlier, which I think is your question … I'd like to say yes," it's a bit of a slap, but she keeps listening. "But it depends on timing. And circumstances. We were married when we got pregnant. It was early and there's no good time but it didn't … we were married. I do think that makes a difference. If we'd gotten pregnant … If we'd gotten pregnant before and we'd … I don't know. But that's not the point. You can't compare what you guys went through to anybody else and judge your actions by anybody else. You know that, Maggie. You just … All you can do is accept the decisions you made and keep making the decision that feels right."

Maggie laughs, hollowly, and pours herself more wine. She offers it to Sloan, who declines. Right. "Every decision I make that feels right turns out to be really fucking wrong."

"Hey," Sloan says, tilting her head toward Emma.

"Right. Sorry. Every decision I make turns out to be really wrong."

"No, I think what you mean is that every decision you make has consequences, which is true. No matter what they'll have consequences. But I've never seen you as a person who is purposefully self-destructive. You get carried away by passions, sure. You can get impulsively emotional, yes. You don't always … or you didn't always, address situations or emotions, because you wanted to avoid conflict. And, you know what? It's a long life. Nothing is ever definite. Not until you die, at least, and you've got 50 years left."

"Wow. That's a great pep talk."

"I'm serious. You and Jim dated when you were what, 28? 29? When I was that age, I was engaged to another guy and called the wedding off the week before the wedding. I thought my life was over."

"You were engaged before Don?"

"Yeah. I thought you knew that?"

"Nope."

"Yeah, I was engaged to an analyst at Goldman; we started dating in grad school. But then I caught him sleeping with one of our coworkers six days before the wedding, and I called off the engagement and I quit working at the bank. I got the job at ACN three months later. If you'd asked me when I was 26, I would have told you that at my age, I would be married to that guy, working at a bank, probably wouldn't have any kids."

"What's your point, exactly?"

"That things change and circumstances change, and life is long. What you think is true or your future one day isn't what happens two years later. So right now all these decisions seem like they're wrong, and it's frustrating, but you don't know how they'll actually play out, truly." She shifts, swinging both her legs around to plant on the concrete. "And that you shouldn't blame yourself, or punish yourself."

"I'm not blaming myself, or punishing myself," Maggie protests. "I'm moving on."

"As you should, and nobody's holding that against you," Sloan stands and swings Emerson onto her hip. She ignores the first half of Maggie's statement. "I think it's time that I rescue Neal and Mariah from Max and Susannah. We're glad to have you back in New York, Maggie."

She sits out there alone for another few moments, until she's interrupted again. "Oh. Hey. Sorry," Jim says. "I just … I wanted some space. But … I'll go."

"No, it's fine," she says, standing and picking up the empty bottle of wine. Whoops. That went quickly. "I've been out here for a while. I need to go in and, you know. Be social. The space is yours." She walks past him. She's not sure what will happen if they're alone.

"Maggie," he calls, and she turns. "I … Hi."

She chuckles. "Hi, Jim."

"I just wanted to say, it was a total coincidence, that we came back at the same time. But, you know, maybe that's good. You've moved and I've moved on, and … you look good, great, actually, and you seem like you're doing really well, which is awesome. Don and Elliot and Mac speak so highly of what you're doing at ACN. I just … I hope we can be friends. After everything."

"I'm friends," she says, crossing her arms. "But … yeah. It's … It's good to see you. And really, congrats on the marriage. That's awesome."

"So we'll … see each other?"

"We work in the same building for the same organization and all of our mutual friends are the same. Yeah, I think we'll see each other," she says. "But like I said, I've been outside long enough. I'm being rude. I'll see you in there," she smiles.

She heads back in, joins Tess and Tamara and Charlotte and Neal's game of gin rummy and feels almost normal. Even so, when everyone's phones start to chime with a news alert, and she and more than half of the party are forced to cut the celebrating short to go cover a terror attack in northern Africa, she's almost relieved.

She wonders what that says about her real emotional state.

She suspects, given that she just found terrorism to be a welcome distraction from her personal problems, that it doesn't say much good.


	8. Don

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this ... is a whopper of a chapter. I really needed to kind of deconstruct Don and Sloan's relationship regarding the job offer, so I took my time (and many many words) getting it spelled out. On the plus side, we get Mrs. Lansing, and the kids, and Reese and Charlie, who are like Click and Clack right now, and awesome.
> 
> I'm not sure if the evolution (devolution?) is entirely in character, so would love to hear what you think. I promise (promise!) that the next chapter will not be so long. I'm now holding myself to 4,000 word maximums. Promise.
> 
> A merging of two people is an impossibility, and where it seems to exist, it is a hemming-in, a mutual consent that robs one party or both parties of their fullest freedom and development. But once the realization is accepted that even between the closest people infinite distances exist, a marvelous living side-by-side can grow up for them, if they succeed in loving the expanse between them." -Rilke

July 4

One month into the new job, and Don Keefer can fully admit that he's not on top of the motherfucking world.

He knew that it would be this way. During his interviews, during endless conversations with Reese and Charlie and Mrs. Lansing, when he had to convince them that he was smart enough and experienced enough to do this, it had become clear that ACN, while still giant and influential, was on the tipping point of insignificance and mediocrity. It didn't pull in the ratings. It didn't have the niche appeal of MSNBC or Fox. It didn't have a broadcast network's buffer of a scripted division (though even that was small comfort when he was at NBC). It wasn't the Internet, and it didn't do GIFs of cat memes. Most troubling, they didn't really have an identity, beyond permanently second or third place. They were an ossified, bureaucratic mess, a cable news network tolerated because of their age and their size, a sinking, slow-moving cruise ship of a company. He knew that it would be long hours just doing this job. But having to manage Will's departure and produce News Night at the same time was making it damn near impossible. He was coming in at 8 and leaving at 11.

He had three major tasks at ACN: First, find the on-air and production talent to halt ACN's slow slide into journalistic oblivion by creating hard-hitting, cutting-edge journalism; second, get ACN consistently in the top two finishes; third, drive innovation in the digital realm so they didn't get fucked with their pants on. Convincing Elliot to come back to eight was a great start: He had the reputation that brought viewers and also allowed them to do news, mixed with the personal stuff that he was great at; it also bought them time to deepen the bench elsewhere. He'd been wasted in the morning, and he knew it. A few scheduling concessions and an impassioned plea from Don to Jeannie had been enough to convince him to switch.

It was exhausting. Which was why he was so damned happy to have a four-day weekend for the Fourth. He and Sloan had considered going away, but then Mac wanted Sloan at this party and honestly, they were too tired to think of a destination. But it meant that he got to make blueberry pancakes with his son, at nine in the morning. Which was pretty damn nice.

"Dad, are we unemployed again?" Max asks happily, mixing the berries into the batter.

"No, bud, it's a holiday. It's America's birthday, like what we talked about. Remember?"

"Nope," Max says. "Are there presents?"

"There are fireworks," he replies.

"And there's the Field Day at Hippo Park with Group, remember Max?" Sloan says, holding hands with both girls as they toddle in. They're both really beginning to get the hang of the walking thing, but Emerson tends to go too fast and ends up injured or screaming, while Susannah tends to get anxious and cries and just wants to be picked up. Both he and Sloan tend to just grab them and walk. They should stop that.

"Aw, man, Max, you're gonna love Field Day," Don says happily. "There are games, and your friends are going to be there, and there might be prizes."

"So, I actually don't think I can make Field Day," Sloan informs him, putting the girls into high chairs. "Mac says she needs help setting up for the party at noon."

"Alright. You want me to take the girls? So you can help out?"

"Why don't I take one of them? Divide and conquer."

"Sounds good," he says, handing her two tiny plates of pancakes to cut up for the girls. "Which one?"

She stares at the twins. "Who wants to go to the park?" she asks.

"Park!" Emerson says. Susannah stuffs pancake in her mouth.

"Emerson it is," Sloan smiles.

"Is America gonna have a birthday cake?" Max asks.

His parents look at each other. "I don't know," Sloan says, swiping a bite of pancake from Susannah's plate. "Mac and Will are going to have all the food. Maybe ice cream."

"I feel like popsicles are standard," Don shrugs. "Maybe we'll get popsicles."

"Possicles!" Susannah chimes in affirmatively. Sloan tries to get her to take a bite of a raspberry, but Annie shrieks and pushes her mom's hand away.

"You know what, not a battle I am fighting today," Sloan says, popping it in her own mouth.

"What time are we supposed to be at Will and Mac's?"

"Most people are coming at four, so just head over after Field Day ends at three?" Sloan steals two more berries from the girls. "Do we have any cereal left? I'm starving and we'll have enough sweets at the party."

"Live a little," he grumbles affectionately as she rises, chomping on his own extra-sweet pancake.

"Reese and Charlie are still coming, right?" she asks as she pours herself some cereal.

"Yeah," he says. "Reese is bringing Roan, so we'll finally get to meet her. I can't wait." The sooner Reese Lansing realizes his mother isn't handing the company over to him until he produces grandchildren to distract her in her retirement, the better for Reese's career (and personal life). Until then, Don is going to continue to watch his dating adventures with amusement. "She just returned from shooting a car-wax commercial in Japan." Roan sounds fantastic. He could not make this shit up.

"Can I get a car, Mom?" Max asks.

"Absolutely," she says. "We can go to the toy store tomorrow," she teases.

"Mom!" Max says, in what they've dubbed his "exasperated teenager" voice. He's also stopped calling them 'Mama' and 'Daddy' in the last few months, an evolution that makes Don surprisingly bereft. "Not a vroom-vroom car. A real one!"

"Oh. A real car? Sure. When you start shaving, we'll talk. Sorry bud," she smiles lightly. She turns to her husband as Max disappointedly digs back into his pancakes. "Do you know — this is weird. Do you know how serious they are?"

"What do you mean? You know ACN's serious! Charlie made a housecall." They were now at the trickiest points of the negotiations: Charlie and Reese assumed that Sloan would just come back if they offered her a fair deal, since Bloomberg was cutting her out of the most basic stuff, and because he was at ACN. He knew that wasn't true at all. The worst mistake to make with Sloan was to assume you had the upper hand or that a particular outcome was inevitable-it was one of the few things she was super-sensitive about, a perception that she would just do something and not decide something. She would dig in her heels and get obstinate and get offended, and he wasn't in a position to talk her down for this one, since she would (correctly) point out his professional and personal stake in her decision. No, she had to make this one on her own, and he had to support it, as a husband.

But it was stressful — ACN was a better fit for her, for her goals and for her journalistic perspective, and they had a pretty small window to make it happen. Once Charlie retired and if he took over, it would become infinitely more complicated. No, if she wanted to make the jump back, it was now or never. He recognized that she felt that it might have something to do with him and she didn't quite earn it, but that was also a real-life consequence of marrying someone in the exact same field: Sometimes your careers bumped into each other.

"No, but I mean, ready to talk numbers and give me an idea of what would be in a contract. It's the only fair way to make a decision."

"Do you really want to tell you?"

"I just think it's weird, that you know more about a nascent job offer than I do," she complained. "It feels very …"

"Nope, don't say it."

"What?"

"You're going for condescending or patriarchal, I can feel it," he says. "It's not either of those. It's just … the reality. Of us working in the same field. In the positions we're in and that we want."

"You're saying that if the situations were reversed, you wouldn't be bothered? Gender and job."

"Honestly? I am. There's no conspiracy or favoritism or … I don't even know … here. I just started six weeks ago. Charlie's been trying to get you back for three years. I don't know how many other ways to reassure you, but I will keep trying."

"I'm just saying, it looks …"

"Is everything OK? You would tell me, right? If something weren't OK?" he interrupts.

"What … what do you mean?"

"It's just, this is … not usual for you, to think that you're getting a fantastic job offer because of anything but your merits. It never occurs to you. You're impressive. I express that enough, right? I … appreciate you enough, right? Because you're being …" he wants to say insecure, but that won't go over well, "You know what you deserve; you have always known what you deserve. But you're acting like you don't."

She looks struck, like she hadn't considered that before. "You're wonderful," she says honestly, pecking him on the lips and emphasizing the 'you're.' "I'm going to get the girls ready."

"But you didn't answer the question," he mutters as she leaves him and Max in the kitchen. "Alright, bud. Men clean up their messes. Let's do the dishes."

"Can I make soap bubbles?" Max jumps out of his booster seat.

It's good to be home.

Group goes excellently, minus the part where Emerson drops an entire popsicle on his shirt. At Will and Mac's, Sloan's worried that they look too matchy-matchy (despite the fact that she's the one who dressed one twin as 'stars' and the other as 'stripes') and Jim is there early, for Mac to 'apologize, or whatever' to him.

"Ready to start Monday?" he asks, popping the cap off a beer.

"Yeah," he says. "I found a place, so I'm all set. It's good to be back."

"Is, um, Alicia coming to New York anytime soon?"

"Yeah, she'll be arriving in early August. It'll be great to have her in town."

"Don! My man," Charlie says, announcing his entrance. "And Jim Harper! In the flesh."

Soon enough, he sees Elliot, Jeannie, and their girls arrive. "Don! Don!" Amelia, their eight-year-old, says. "Did you bring the twins?"

"Legally, I have to," he says. "They're with Neal."

"Awesome!" Amelia runs off.

"Thanks for asking!" Elliot calls.

"I can't believe you made me come," Ava, their 12-year-old, sighs. "It's all babies and old people." She uses one hand as a visor against her adolescent mortification.

"Let's go talk to Mac and meet Nora. And look, there's Anderson, let's go say hi," Jeannie steers her away.

"Teenagers," Don says. "They sound awesome."

"Yeah, at this point she'd notice if we tried to give her back," Elliot says drily. "Only seven more years, I've heard. How're you? Every time I see you at work you're tense."

"It's a much-needed four-day weekend," he acknowledges.

"Sloan's talking to Reese today?"

"Yeah, and she's being weird about it."

"Weird?"

"Yeah. This is like … defying explanation." He shook his head. "Anyways. Have you seen Maggie? I want to chat about EPs with her, see what her take is."

Elliot turns his head, and Don follows. "There she is," he points, and he sees a supremely uncomfortable Maggie talking with Mac. "That looks like a fun conversation." Mac bops Maggie in the shoulder (oh, hell, they're talking about Jim) and then Maggie bolts for them.

"Maggie, we were just talking about you," he says, before realizing that can and probably will set her off.

Instead, she just smiles tightly. "Hopefully about what an amazing and talented senior producer I am."

"Actually along those lines," he recovers. "Let's pick an EP, people."

Elliot's opinion basically comes down to "Mike Finley, and only Mike Finley," which means, starting Monday, they're going to have to convince his old second-in-command to leave NBC as well. Another fantastic task ahead.

Maggie excuses herself once they're done, and he turns to see Sloan heading toward him. "We were having a conversation, and I decided that I wanted you there. Got a sec?"

"Sure," he says. "But why do you want me?"

"Because professionally, this is a negotiation that you should be involved with. Charlie would have you there with anybody else. And personally, I trust you to put mine and our interests above ACN's, and I'm showing you that."

"Is that what all this is about?" he asks, astonished. "Is that seriously what this is about?" Because if she was saying that she trusted him, at one point, she had doubted it.

"Will you just come?"

In the library, the sounds of the party are muted as he leans against the green leather couch. Sloan says, "We were really just getting started. Gentlemen, please continue."

"Right," Reese says, irritated. "I mean, this will come as no surprise to either of you." Don can feel Sloan's eyes watching him, and he's annoyed, because she's being pretty distrustful for no reason about the whole damn thing. "We want you back at ACN, Sloan. This is us, making a play, for you. You're one of the most popular anchors in daytime and you've got the social media footprint to boot. But most importantly, you bring clout and gravitas, and we're a network sorely in need of both. My mother, god bless her soul, is going to stay in this world for a long time, but she's not going to be at the network much longer. We need to shore up talent and prestige for when that day comes. We want you."

"First off, thank you. ACN took a chance on me a long time ago, and I know it. You launched my journalism career. For which I am grateful."

"You were well worth the investment," Reese says.

"Thank you. Second, I do want to be clear: I haven't made any decisions yet, and I'm not making it today. I went to Bloomberg for a pretty specific purpose, which was serious coverage of the economy, among other issues. ACN's track record has been abysmal over the last couple years, and it's gotten plenty of stories wrong — wrong suspects in terrorist attacks, hasty breaking news, incorrect election calls, race-baity trial coverage, limited real non-political news or international news. It's tough to turn around a big boat. I want to hear the plan to make sure I'm not coming to a network that's falling apart. If I come."

"Well, we just hired a new director of international news. He's supposed to be good, or so I've heard," Charlie interrupts.

"And the rest of it I'm going to correct," Don says, studying her, from the corner. "It's not an easy balance to get news right and to get ratings, and it has been off the last couple years. And yeah, dayside's had the hardest time striking that balance. But we know it and we're changing it. I don't believe it when people say only polemics want news. We're going to make it happen."

She shifts. "Where are you thinking of putting me?"

"We're prepared to offer you two hours in the afternoon, three to five, or four to six, and a seat at the table for major ACN broadcasts — breaking news, elections; really, whenever you want to move there," Reese says. "We see your show as a serious mix of the stuff people just have to know, in the right context. It's the afternoon, they've been stuck in their offices all day, work is finally slowing down, and they want to hear the top stories of the day. It's not a space for fluff or sensationalism. You'll have a top team, of your own choosing. We'll set aside 600K for salaries to bring on three producers of your choice, including the EP. But you're the managing editor, and you'd have free reign on the show's content, provided you hit your mandate."

"What's the mandate?" Sloan asks.

"800,000 viewers, a 2+ share in 18-49s," Reese says.

"That's a top two-finish every day. That's right below Fox. And Fox gets all the cray-crays."

"We'll give you time to build to there," Charlie says. "And you're pulling basically those numbers. At lunchtime. On Bloomberg. That's not going to be hard. You're going to be our main dayside anchor, and you'll be there as we start tackling the big, structural issues to overhaul coverage."

"And, just to be totally upfront, we'd like to put in an option for primetime, in three years. We know that you've got kids to consider, and we respect that," Reese adds. "But I'm going to be taking over this company soon, and I want you to be one of the main faces of ACN."

"The girls are only going to be four in three years; do you know when a four-year-old's bedtime is? Seven-thirty."

"Sloan, let's not get ahead of ourselves thinking about what our lives are going to be in three years," Don says, slipping into husband mode, which is potentially a mistake.

She doesn't, though. "What's your salary offer?"

"How serious are you about considering the jump?" Reese counters.

"I think an offer has the potential to sway me," she says. "That, and your official position on earthquake coverage."

"Three million, and you can report from the studio. We'd like you to start in November with the midterm coverage," Reese says. "Think about it, Sloan. " He exits, presumably to find Roan (who is just as fabulous as Don imagined).

Charlie hesitates. "I'm legacy-building here, Sabbith," he says. "I've worked at ACN since 1969. I'm not asking because I like you."

"I know, sir," she says.

He leaves, too.

She looks down, her arms folded. "I really am going to need to be convinced that ACN isn't going to become a CNN 2.0."

"So you'll think about it?"

"Yeah," she says. "I already was."

"You know you know most of the plans already, right?" he says as they head out.

"As your wife. Not as your potential anchor," she says. "It's different." She inhales deeply. "I need air."

"I'll come with you."

"Sloan, Don, I thought you might want Emerson back," Jeannie Hirsch says, semi-apologetically, as they head outside. "She kind of got away from Amelia, and Gary had her —"

"Oh, God," Don says, because Gary should never have a child with him, ever.

"I know," she smiles. "I would love to keep her, but I've got a twelve-year-old that's acting like a two-year-old. I'd much prefer her though."

"No, no, of course. Thanks for taking care of her," Sloan says, taking Emerson and letting her slide down to walk. He looks around and sees Susannah and Max still happily playing with Neal. "You were trying to play with Gary, huh, Em?"

"Gar-Gar," she says. "Play ball." They exchange a look, wondering what the hell that means.

"Let's go outside, Em," she says.

"I want sun!" she says affirmatively.

He and Sloan each take one of Emerson's hands as they head out. "You know, from a purely self-interested point of view, it's a good offer," he says. It's true. It's double what she's making now, and more than what he's currently making. And Manhattan private schools are expensive.

"I know. I need to mull it over."

"Right. But I don't think you need to mull over the actual offer," he says as they walk down the terrace.

"No, but I need to mull over my career, and the kids, and our families."

"Is that what this is about? The working-mom thing?"

"I mean, partially, yes." He's frustrated; what's the other partially? He's completely bewildered by her thought process and just wants in.

"You know we're in this together, right? We said partners, with the kids, with jobs, everything. I know it's been tough with the new job, but it's temporary. Once Elliot switches over and we get an EP for him, I'll be around more."

"I'm just saying I need to think about it —"

And, she's evading. Back to square one. "And I'm just saying it's solid."

"I need to consider what I want to do and what's right for me, and for us, rather than what's easy. Anyways. You should go help. Will needs you." she turns to face him, squinting in the sun as she swings Emma onto her hip.

He hesitates, because he would like to get to the bottom of whether or not she trusts him on this, and whether or not she's worried about their balance, but she looks serious and distant, so he just kisses her cheek and heads over to the grill. Will is happily flipping burgers in a stupid apron.

As he takes the spatula and a beer from Will, he asks, "Did you ever had any trust issues with Mac, when she was your producer?"

Will stares at him. "Are you fucking with me, or did you just fall and hit your head on something hard?"

"Right," he says after a beat. That was dumb. "Sorry."

He's helping Nora and Max make plates up for Mac and Sloan when Maggie pops her head out. "Either of you check your phones?" she asks.

"Not in the last five minutes; did the world blow up?" he asks, helping Nora squeeze out ketchup.

"Close. Terror attack at a movie theatre in Algiers that a lot of American diplomats and tourists frequent."

"Seriously?"

"No, I just thought a terror attack on the Fourth of July would be funny," she says, rolling her eyes. "Let's go. We need to get to the studio."

"Hold on a second," Will says. "I have to get these hamburgers off the grill. Charlie! Get him. Is he still here?" Maggie disappears.

"Don," Sloan says, sticking her head out. "There's a terrorist attack —"

"Movie theatre in Algiers, I know."

"I need to call Rowan," she says unnecessarily, since the phone is already pressed to her ear. "I'm probably going to need to go in. Are Keiko or Cristina in town this weekend? Hi — Rowan, can you hear me?"

They're not, so he's already dialing his younger half-sister, Lily, who is their backup babysitter. She needs the cash, they need the hands. "Hi, Lil?" he says, when she picks up.

"Bro-ski! Happy Fourth of July! Isn't America wonderful?" she slurs expressively.

"You're drunk," he says, heart falling.

"I am a legal adult," she says. "I knooooow that is hard for you, sometimes, because it makes you confront your own mortality, but I am exercising my hard-earned right to party. On this lovely, American day, for which many men and women have died for our freedom."

"No, Lily, I need a sitter. There's been a thing, and Sloan and I both need to go into work. Can you … are you capable of sobering up?"

"Yeah, I'll be right in," Sloan hangs up her phone. "Is that Lily? Is she drunk? She is not watching our kids if she is."

"What kind of thing are talking about?"

"Terrorist attack in North Africa."

"Oh, my god. Where are you guys? I can totally be there." Sloan is shaking her head.

"I think we're going to get someone else to take the kids, Lils," he says. "Have a fun Fourth."

"Nope. I am there for you. Where are you? I'm in Williamsburg; I can be anywhere in half an hour."

He hesitates. "We're at Mac and Will's. West 58th Street. I'm going to text you the address, alright? Thanks, Lil."

Sloan stares at him, astonished. "Did you just agree to let a drunk twenty-three-year-old watch our kids? Because I have a few objections to that."

"She's not … that drunk. We'll have Mac decide whether she's ready to take them, alright? Do you need to go in?"

"Yeah, I do."

"You should head over."

"Why can't we have Jeannie or Mac watch them?"

"That's … not a bad idea."

"See? Two seconds of thought, mister," Sloan says, slightly exasperated.

"We need to go," Maggie says. She's on the phone calling in everyone she can find, and he should be doing that as well.

"You head over, alright?" he says. "Get everyone in. I'll be there right behind you." Maggie looks hesitant, but heads back in yelling, "Come on, people!"

"Don, Sloan, if you guys need me to look after the kids, I think the party is still going to go on," Mac says. "Only about half of you are leaving. It's not a big deal. Neal's staying, I'm staying, Jeannie's staying. Just leave the diaper bag and they'll be fine. Sloan, you really need to go."

"Alright," she says, swiftly kissing him. "Call me when you get off?"

"Yeah," he says as she exits. He turns to Mac. "So Aunt Lily is coming over, just so you have an extra set of hands. However, Aunt Lily might be a little tipsy, so just keep her here and make sure she doesn't drop one of the girls? I mean, you guys can still watch the fireworks, right?" He should hopefully be able to hand coverage over by then, but you never know.

"Got it. Go to work."

He's saying goodbye to the kids — who are not having it, as per usual — when Jim comes up. "Mind if I start the new position a few days early?"

He doesn't hesitate. Jim has most of the contacts in that area. "Absolutely. Let's go."

By the time they hit the studio, Will's putting his earpiece in and Maggie's in the control room, having four conversations on three phones. Jim's got the embassy in Algiers on the phone and they've got everybody who's in the city back in the studio, including several tank-topped associate producers. He grabs his headset, telling Maggie, "I'm going to need an update in about three minutes." She nods, and he turns to Herb. "How long until we're ready to switch over?"

"Two more minutes."

"Will, did Charlotte give you the latest updates?" he flicks through the notes he's been handed, then grabs his phone when he sees Jim calling in. "Yeah?"

"Embassy sources — two, they're good — are saying that there are at least eight dead so far, don't know if they're American or not, and up to fifty injured."

"Get me bomb details, alright?" he hangs up. "Will, Jim's sources are saying that there are eight dead so far, up to fifty injured but that number isn't steady, no clue if they're American or not."

"We're good to go," Herb says.

"Live in 30," he yells. "Somebody get that text loaded!" He turns to Maggie. "Now that Jim's back, who's our closest correspondent in the area?"

She hesitates. "Mick is in Rome on vacation. He's a two-hour flight away."

"He's a European correspondent. He doesn't speak Arabic. Where's Jhumpra?"

"Tel Aviv. It's an eight-hour trip. We can get a translator for Mick. Plus, he speaks French and so do most of the elites."

He sighs. It's not the best. "Tell Jim to make this happen," he says.

"I can do it," she replies.

"No. Jim has the contacts on the ground. This isn't the time to be stubborn. I don't care if you text him, just make sure he knows."

"Fine," she says, walking straight out of the control room."

"— Reports of a bomb exploding at a movie theatre in Algiers, Algeria. It's a venue frequented by Americans living in the capital city, though we don't — again, I stress, we don't — know if any of those present during the attacks were Americans. Sources in the American Embassy in Algiers believe that there are eight dead, with as many as fifty injured. Those numbers, of course, are preliminary —" Will rambles on in the background, and he nods affirmatively. This guy's going to be tough to replace.

Jim bursts in. "Did Maggie find you?"

"What? No. Listen. I have the chief of security at the American Embassy, if we want him to speak."

"What? Yes. Put him through. Will? We've got —"

"Matt Crispin."

"—Matt Crispin, chief of security at the American Embassy in Algiers, on the phone. Patching him through now."

Before he knows it he looks up and it's eight-thirty. They've been repeating facts for the last hour, so he feels comfortable turning to Maggie and saying, "Can you handle this now?"

She nods. "You've got a half hour until the fireworks. Go watch with Max. Tell him I say hi."

Back at Mac's, he finds Sloan sitting in front of one of those TVs, a wiped-out Annie starfished across her torso, Emma curled up next to her. She looks peaceful. "You just get back?"

"Yeah. Nothing more to report," she shrugs. "Lily is with Ava. Ava thinks she's the coolest, apparently. And Max is over there with Neal. I think he likes Neal better than us. What if this is a conspiracy of Neal's and he's totally going to kidnap our kid?"

He carefully runs his hands under Emma and scoops her up, like a sack of potatoes. She flops against his shoulder, readjusting herself before falling back deeper into sleep. "I think it's nice that we have nice friends."

"Daddy! You're back. Neal says it's time for the fireworks," Max says, running up. He wrinkles his nose at his sisters. "We get to watch right?"

"Yeah, they're far away. The girls won't wake up," he says.

"Do you remember them from last year, Max?" Sloan asks.

"Not really," he admits. "But I was only three then. That was little, right?"

She laughs. "You're right. You're a lot bigger now." Outside, they find two lawn chairs draped in a blanket each, and they set the girls on one, rolling them up like pigs in a blanket. Then the three of them pile onto the remaining lounger, him in back, Sloan in his arms, Max in Sloan's.

"Where are the fireworks gonna be?" Max asks. "They're like sparkles in the sky, Neal says."

"They're going to be that way," Sloan points, kissing his temple softly. "Over the river."

Max settles back. "America has the best birthday party ever."

"Hey, look, they're starting," Don says, pointing to the skyline. "See 'em, Max?"

"Whoa," Max says, standing up abruptly. Sloan leans forward — away from Don — and grabs his hips to steady him. "Nora! You see them?" he yells.

"Big," Nora says from the chair where she's with Mac. "Yes."

"They're so shiny," Max says rapturously. "I love fireworks."

The show is over in twenty minutes, and Max is asleep in Sloan's arms in twenty-two. "Not quite the Fourth of July we had planned, huh?" she asks, leaning back. They'll move soon enough.

He wraps his arms around her and Max, eyes on the still-slumbering girls, and goes, "No. But it was pretty us."

An indeterminate amount of time later, Lily comes up to them. "I'm going to head back out to Brooklyn," she says. "Do you want help getting home first, though?"

"Yeah," Sloan says as she struggles to get up without waking Max. She slowly swings him over to her hip. He's so big now that his legs dangle past her knees.

"I'll take one of the girls," Lily offers, moving to grab Annie.

"The bjorn's inside," he says as he lifts Em, who makes an unintelligible noise before falling asleep. "And the car's in the garage."

"I'll just carry her down," Lily says. "Where are the bags and everything?"

"Also inside," Sloan says.

"I'll grab them," Lily says. "You guys say goodnight to Mac." She tilts her head toward their clutch of desk chairs, and they head that way.

"We're leaving," Sloan says softly. Nora is sleeping on top of Mac. "Don't get up. Thanks for having us over."

"Sorry terrorism happened," Don adds.

Mac waves them away sleepily. "Unavoidable," she smiles.

They fall asleep before they can really talk, and Sloan's up with the kids the next morning — she likes doing wake-ups since she gets them so infrequently — but his phone buzzes him up at 8 anyways. He blinks four times when he sees the name on the screen. "Hello?" he asks, confused.

"Don. How are you?" the unmistakable voice of the one and only Leona Lansing greets him.

"Mrs. Lansing. I'm — I'm well. How are you?" Shit. She should be in Southampton, he's positive.

"Pretty good. I was at this fabulous Fourth of July party last night and tried to talk to Kanye West about the divorce, you know, but he was only speaking in iambic pentameter. So fucking pretentious," she sighs. "I did see Beyonce and Gwyneth doing shots together though. Would love to know when they made up."

"Wouldn't we all?" he says in a deadpan tone, scratching the nape of his neck. What does she want?

"Right," she chuckles. "I've decided that I want to hear yours and Reese's plans for my company."

"Alright, well, I can put together a presentation for you by Monday," he starts, with the sinking feeling that his weekend with the kids just disappeared.

"No, I've had enough of those. I've called Reese, and he's coming down. You need to, as well. Bring Sabbith and the rugrats; there's plenty of room. Maybe I'll call up Charlie as well; he'll be feeling left out, I suppose."

He hits his head against the headboard. There's no way he's getting out of this.

Three hours later, they're en route to Southampton. "Maybe we should get beach house," Sloan muses, staring out the window. She'd taken his absurd request much better than he anticipated.

"You physically hate being out of the city. You describe yourself as an 'indoor kid.' You really think you're going to enjoy the beach?" he teases.

"It'd be nice to have the space," she rebuts.

"We have a two-story apartment in Manhattan. Four thousand square feet. Five bedrooms. A home office and a media center. It doesn't get much roomier than that."

"You're the one who would like it best, pal. Why the objections?"

He shrugs. "Let's pay more of this one down," he says. Buying a second apartment and renovating both so extensively to get the two-story apartment had not been cheap. "Plus, we have my family's place in Cape May and your parents' place in Carmel if we ever want to borrow something for a weekend."

"Yes, let's just fly to Carmel for two days," she mocks, but the subject's dropped.

Mrs. Lansing's place is a palatial white clapboard estate, with a pool and two tennis courts and a paddock with three honest-to-god horses visible before they even get out of the car. Sloan's jaw visibly drops when they get out of the car. "You sure you don't want a house in the Hamptons?" she asks again.

"You're gonna have to negotiate a way higher salary," he retorts as they carry the kids in.

"Sloan. Don," Mrs. Lansing, wearing a pair of oversized sunglasses, says from the front porch. "Welcome. Charlie's making Long Island iced teas."

"Let's get the kids settled first," Don says.

"Bonita will show you to your rooms," she says with a wave of her hand.

There's a nursery, clearly waiting for Reese, for the kids. They unload all of their stuff, and Max insists on changing into his swim trunks. Bonita leads them all back to the pool, where there's a lunch spread already out, and Roan is blinking, confused and probably hungover, in the sunlight.

"I want to thank you all for coming," Mrs. Lansing starts, holding up her Bloody Mary. "As you employees of mine are well aware, ACN is sliding, and I'm sick of it. I want money. And I want viewers. So I want solutions. And I figured, inspiration is easier to come by at the beach than in Midtown. So your house is my house, and I want a plan by the end of the weekend."

Don grew up comfortable, and has long been able to pay his bills. He knows that he's lucky that they're in a place where he and Sloan can hire fantastic, multilingual nannies, and have a housekeeper to help out. But they've got nothing on Mrs. Lansing. There's a staff of at least five there at all times. Someone carries the diaper bag when he and Sloan are struggling to get the kids out to the pool. Someone refills his glass when he and Reese are spitballing in the sunroom. When Sloan explains that Emma is really only eating peaches these days and no other fruits, the fruit appears. It's all utterly bizarre.

He, Reese, and Charlie spend most of Friday after lunch and Saturday in the library, quietly pow-wowwing over the future of the network. Nobody ever quite agrees, but they make progress. There's agreement on what the lineup and corporate and news priorities. Sloan and the kids spend both days cycling between the pool and the beach. He's not sure what Mrs. Lansing does.

"Have you figured out why she decided to invite us up here?" Sloan asks Saturday night when the kids are asleep.

"To work," he shrugs, briefly glancing up from his Kindle.

"Yeah, but it seems … like there's an ulterior motive. Or something," she muses.

"It's work. This is my job now."

"I'm not saying that. I get that, alright?" they haven't talked about the ACN offer all weekend, and he wonders if now is the time. "It just seems very out-of-character for Mrs. Lansing."

He shrugs, then smirks. "I've learned to stop questioning the motivations of the myriad beautiful, smart, powerful women I am surrounded with. I'm just along for the ride."

"I've trained you well, young Padawan," she teases, then kisses him lightly. "You know what, I forgot to make my tea. Do you want hot chocolate?"

"No, but I could eat something. I'll go down," he says.

"You sure?" she says as she settles deeper into the pillows. "Thanks."

He's boiling some water when a voice asks, "Couldn't sleep either?"

He jumps, more than a little self-conscious at Mrs. Lansing seeing him in his shorts and a t-shirt. But she doesn't seem to mind that she's in a silk bathrobe and slippers, so he tries to play it cool. "Not quite," he says. "Sloan likes to have tea before bed. Even when it's 100 degrees out."

"So you volunteered to do so," she surmises. "She's a capable woman, you know."

Don's always been a big believer in feminism, but mostly a believer in the fact that merit is gender-blind, so the last several days have left him at the end of his rope. "I know that. I'm not sure how me making tea for her diminishes that. We're partners. I do things for her without it being a power struggle or a … statement."

She smiles ruefully, dodging the question. "No marriage is ever a true partnership, Don. It all balances out in the end, if you're lucky, but someone always owe a little bit more, loves a little bit more. How are you liking my estate?"

"It's very nice," he says, testing Sloan's tea. "Why are we here, though?" he blurts out.

"I want a plan, for my company," she reiterates.

"No, seriously, though —"

"I want a plan. For my company," she says. "You think that Charlie's the only one retiring soon? You think you were brought back to replace Charlie? You've already done that. You're doing that job in all but name already."

"Charlie is still the president of news. He is still doing his job."

"My dear boy," she says. "When I step down — much to my son's relief — he'll move up to President and CEO of AWM. And then who will be president of the network? It's not like he's produced a Prince William to step into the role. Or, hell, even a Prince George."

He's momentarily distracted from by her Windsor analogy to realize — "this was a test run for Reese's job?"

"Yes. You know how light the bench is. Who else but you?"

"That's a ringing endorsement."

"That's better than most usually get from me," she says. "Nothing is decided, obviously. I still don't know when I'm retiring. I keep waiting for grandchildren, but now I'm thinking, maybe I give him the job and step back, and that'll do it. But I wanted to see you two actually work together." she picks up her glass of water. "Have a good night. Tell Sabbith to enjoy her tea."

Well, fuck.

He keeps his conversation with Mrs. Lansing to himself the next day, as they wrap up their brainstorming sessions and all take off back to Manhattan (or Connecticut, in the Skinners' case), and as they eat sushi and get the kids, tuckered out after a wedding of sand and swimming, into bed early. As he and Sloan flop down on the couch, though, he asks, "Are we partners?"

She's got her head in his lap, and she just laughs without looking up. "We're married. It's a few years late to ask that question."

"That didn't actually answer my question," he says, and something in his voice makes her sit up and take him seriously.

"I … don't know what you mean. Do we split things equally every day? No. But do we try to in the long run? Yes, I think so. And we make big decisions together, so yes, I count that. I think of you before I make plans and I'm raising kids with you so, yes, you're my partner. Why?"

"Mrs. Lansing said something … you know what, nevermind. But, actually, we haven't made the ACN job offer decision together."

"I haven't made a decision. I don't even know what I think about it. How can I ask you what you think about it?"

"I don't know, to help you figure out what you think about it? Just a guess," he says. "It's clearly bugging you, and I can't figure out why. Do you trust me? I can't tell. Is this a work-life-mom balance thing? I can't tell. And if we are partners, it should be neither of those things."

She stares at him. "I don't know what to tell you."

"I need you to say something. I need you to tell me how you're feeling about it, and why. Because you're upset about it, and I can't figure out why."

"What happens if my show flops?" she finally says, after a long beat. "What happens if my show flops, or I say something radically offensive on air, or do something that ACN doesn't like? I move back to ACN, you move into Charlie's role —"

"It could actually be Reese's role," he confesses, regretfully. He owes it to her, since it's sounding like her major objections are, fundamentally, a trust thing.

"What?" she yells involuntarily. "Reese's job?"

"That's another thing Mrs. Lansing brought up last night."

"Jesus, you two had a hell of a conversation in that kitchen," she snarks. "She wants you for Reese's job?"

"You know, it's a good thing, for me," he points out.

She's stricken. "I know that. I'm sorry." She sits down. "I need to process."

"What is there to process? It's something, a possibility, way in the future. Nothing has happened yet. But I wanted you to know."

She purses her lips and does that thing where she makes herself make as small as possible. She runs her hands through her hair. "This … is what I am talking about. I move to ACN, and all I can see is problems. I … mess up a story, or I disagree with ACN, and you're my boss and my husband. What if it doesn't work out? What if you have to fire me, or move me, for the good of the network? And between that, and my dad being at the Fed — I'm done. I'm untouchable. Bloomberg bumps me into their big leagues to be their star, and I leave after one three-year contract to go to my husband's network? That's bad faith. I don't get a job anywhere."

"Of course you do," he says. "I think you're overthinking this."

"I'm really not," she says, "We're in a perception industry, and you know it." She's partially right.

"I think you're making a lot of assumptions, and you're … complicating things that don't need to be complicated."

"You would be my boss. That is a fact. That's not complicating things. I would work for your network. And it … it pisses me off, Don. It goddamn pisses me off," she finally confesses in a brittle voice.

He's struck, and he sits back down. "I'm sorry," he says unnecessarily.

"For what?" she says thickly. "Don, you're my husband. I love you. I want you to succeed. You're great at your job, and you deserve whatever promotion the Lansings want to give you."

"Yeah, but if it's fucking you over, it's hurting you, so that's hurting me," he says.

"I didn't know what to do, or to say, to you, because you'll try and fix it," she says.

"Well, yeah. I'll always try and fix it," he says.

"It's a very lovable and aggravating tendency," she rebukes lightly. "It's just … I work my ass off. And I know that's why I'm getting the ask, I really do. But if I take it … If I take it it negates all that hard work. It doesn't matter what it is, it matters what it looks like. I'm the employee, I'm the second hired, I'm the one in front of the camera. I'm the wife. It all looks … not great."

"For the record, everyone who wears a suit at a network knows that it's not because of that. We could … plant stories, in TMI or People or whatever, addressing it. A profile of you, an interview about what it's like to manage a complicated job and a home-life balance … It's relatable. If you would want to move on in the future, that would help with that."

She makes a face. "I hate talking about the kids."

"I know. I just … I want you to be happy, Sloan. You haven't been happy for weeks. What if you left Bloomberg and went to another network?"

She pauses, then shakes her head. "I don't know. I hadn't thought of it. My first thought is … I'm not really a fan of that."

"Well, you're going to need to do something. Just sitting here and … waiting … is going to leave you less satisfied with your choice in the end. I can help, Sloan, if you let me I can help and give you advice, and listen, and whatever ... but we both know that you have to make the call here. That's the only way neither of us is resentful long-term."

"What did Mrs. Lansing say to you?" she asks.

"She said all marriages were power struggles. Why?"

"Just curious."

"Do you believe that?"

"Yes. We share it, it's complementary, but it's a struggle."

"We don't normally fight."

"No, but that's … there's tradeoffs, and they manifest themselves in struggles. I think that's a fair description of marriage. And, for what it's worth — right now you have the power in every way, shape, and form. You'd be my boss. With stock options, if you got Reese's job, you'd make way more money. You're also the guy, which, I know you hate this card, but it's easier to do the work-life balance thing when you're not being sniped at by mommy-bloggers on the Internet. So of course you don't want to call it a power struggle, because it makes you feel bad."

He's already pretty drained by this fight, so he's not about to start a tangential argument about the power dynamics of a modern marriage. So he simply says, "For what it's worth, I think a network like ACN is the best fit for you. I think it aligns better with your goals of bringing a high level of economic analysis to as many people as possible. I think you're good at international news and politics coverage, and you get to do more of that at ACN. I think you're sick of how much you have to deal with Wall Streeters. I think, like I've said before, that Bloomberg plays too much inside baseball for your taste. I also think, from a producer's standpoint, that they waste your talent. I think you can keep doing good work there, work that you should be proud of, and work that I am proud of, but I think it's becoming obvious that you do more for them than they do for you. Long-term, if you want to stretch yourself and keep evolving, you should move networks. I don't care which one. I don't think you'd like Fox too much, but that's just me. Bloomberg was a great choice three years ago but isn't now, and I think, no matter what your feelings on ACN are, no matter how much you trust or don't trust me to represent your interests in the ACN negotiations, you need to acknowledge at least that much. If you don't want to go to ACN, I think you should start looking at other networks."

She's struck. "Thank you. You really think that's the best choice?" She's serious and curious.

He finally loses it, though he's not sure why. "For whom, Sloan? We haven't settled on that. I think for you, ACN's still the best choice for your career. You probably won't get an offer like that from CNN. You'd get the hours but not the voice. For me — hell no. You at ACN is the best choice on every level. I love working with you. We can bring the dog again. I like having you in the building and getting to watch you tape and sneaking lunch and whatever. For the kids? I'm not sure. Their tuition's getting paid no matter what, at this point. But for our marriage? If it's going to cause rifts like this, over and over again? We'd get sick of it. We'd probably split up. Not right away, but eventually. And — god, Sloan. That's the worst-case scenario. So if that's what you see happening, you feeling trapped and you not being able to get beyond the fact that I would be your boss, if you couldn't trust me to respect you as an anchor and as my wife, after six years of marriage and three kids and a dog and a condo, then please. Please, please, please don't take the job. It's selfish, but please. Don't. Not if it's going to tear us apart."

"This is exactly what I was afraid of!" she shouts. "You're acting like it's my job that we're fighting about, even though your job has the exact same amount to contribute to the situation. But it's my job that you're blaming here!"

"I'm sorry it worked out to offer me this job nine months ahead of when it worked out for ACN to make you an offer!" he yells back. "I'm sorry! I am! I think it's dumb! But for what it's worth, if you had my job and they were giving me your offer, with the money and the time concessions, to build a quality network, I would still take it! I've said that all along! You're being stubborn! It's not perfect, but it's pretty fucking good, Sloan. So what if the timing is off? You really think your show is going to flop? Really? After ten years of doing this? After all your awards? After the salary offers you get? You think you're unprofessional and I'm going to have to fire you? I have a little higher opinion of you than that. I don't think this will be a problem, but if you want to make it a problem, I know you can do it. At a fundamental level, if you're talking power dynamics, right now, what you choose and how you react to your choice — that's the rest of our marriage, there. I know the timing, the offer, the fact that I would be your boss eventually, sucks. I am asking you to trust me, if you take the ACN job. But mostly I'm asking that if we don't make the choice together, you at least make the choice that keeps us married because at the end of the day, that's what I fucking care about. I'm at your mercy. We're at your mercy. And that's all the goddamn power you can have in a marriage."

She sighs. "If you can't help me make a decision without getting angry when I'm trying to be honest, I'm going to bed." She exits, spent.

And like that, the anger gets sucked out of him, like a balloon deflating suddenly. He doesn't follow her, because he doesn't know what to say. He overplayed his hand and hadn't fought fair, but she put him in a fucking tough spot — nothing he said would have been right. So he watches a little more TV, dozes off a bit, finally mans up and pads upstairs. The lights are off, her back is to the door.

"I'm sorry, if it sounded like I was belittling your job," he says into the void. "Or your feelings on the offers. I know it sucks. I just wish I could fix it."

"I know you do," she says, the sheets rustling as you turn. "And I would never make a decision that would end up in us getting a divorce. I'm just … stuck. Rock, meet hard place, you know? It's something that I hate. And I have to … figure that out first." He sheds his jeans and shirt and slides into bed, and she studies him. "Right now, I think you have more faith in me and in us than I do. Which is fine. It's not what I'm used to, but it's fine. … I do trust you, you know."

"We'll figure it out," he promises, kissing her lightly, and there's nothing more to say. The words feel empty. It's not a tension that can be resolved with a happy apology. They lapse into a not-quite-comfortable silence, both pretending to be asleep. He thinks she drifts off first, but as he slips out of consciousness, he's not quite sure.

Soo... thoughts, if you made it this far? Would love to hear!


	9. Jim

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! It's been a while since I've been around these here parts - is anyone still reading? I still intend on working on this story but school + work are pretty all-consuming right now so it's a little tough. But I still love this story and these characters, and hope I'm doing them justice! Up next, we've got a time jump and our first extended interactions with Alicia. I'm trying to portray all these relationships genuinely. Would love to hear your feedback.
> 
> I am good, I am grounded  
> Davy says that I look taller  
> I can't get my head around it  
> I keep feeling smaller and smaller
> 
> -The National, I Need My Girl

August 17

"So everything ready for Alicia?" Neal pants, driving the ball past Jim and swishing it into the hoop.

Jim retrieves the ball and dribbles it a few times. "I guess? I mean, I had the cleaning lady come, and I asked her if she thought I had decorated the apartment enough. She didn't think orange was a good color for the curtains and thought my bowls looked cheap — whatever that means — but yeah. I'm ready." He's excited to have Alicia in New York; to make this their city together. Her Peace Corps commitment had ended a few weeks ago, then she'd gone to Riyadh to visit family. "She gets in Sunday." It's Friday.

"She figure out what she wants to do in New York?" Neal asks as Jim passes him the ball. Neal takes another shot. He scores. Damn.

"Nah. She's going to take a few months, I think, and figure that out." He's confident that there's a job that will keep in her New York City; he just has to convince her to take it. She's not sure exactly what she wants to do, but she's smart and talented and he can't wait to see where she ends up. "I'm excited for her to meet everyone, though. What about you? You guys actually starting the wedding planning?" Neal had finally proposed a few weeks ago, and the two of them had since been basking in the engagement.

"It's going great," a smile cracks across Neal's face. "I mean, we haven't done too much, but we started looking at flowers. I never thought … I never thought I'd ever care about that stuff, you know? I mean, it's just bloody flowers. But I do. It's bizarre." He sinks another shot. "I like it," he says decidedly.

"It's pretty sweet," he agrees, though they didn't really do any of that. He finally gives up, tosses the ball back to Neal and heads for his bag. "You're going to Will's tonight?" Will's last show had been a few weeks ago and, in honor of his retirement, ACN was throwing a big bash at NoMad. Mac wasn't happy about it, but he'd gotten the impression that throwing it wasn't optional.

"Mac'd kill me otherwise," Neal grins. "We're heading over around eight, yeah?"

"See ya then," Jim acknowledges. "You should shave before Alicia gets back, you know. You're looking a little scruffy," he teases.

"Fuck you," he calls, but he shaves before he heads down to the Flatiron district.

He has to show ID to enter the party, and there's some gossip press and a few AWM-affiliated photogs around the entrance. It's swank, he thinks as he scratches his nose. He kinda wishes that Alicia was there to share it. He's a little lost. Mac, wearing a loosely belted navy tunic and clutching a drink, is the first to notice him. "Jim!" she cries, throwing open her arms. "Welcome."

"Looks like the party is already in swing," he grins. Ronan Farrow and Matt Damon are chatting by a chocolate fountain, Idina Menzel and Cynthia Nixon are dancing to no music, and Andrea Mitchell looks beyond bored as she taps on her cell phone. "This is pretty ritzy."

"Wait till you see the cake," Mac says, brushing the bangs out of her face. "And thank Leona."

"Did you guys bring Nora?"

"Christ, no. She's with the Keefer kids. It's our first time leaving her, actually," she smiles tepidly. "But, come on in! Lots of people. Lots to do."

He's passed around from group to group, until he ends up with a tipsy Will and Brian Williams, as they do pour drinks. "Here, take one with us, Jimmy," Will orders. "Kavalan whisky. Best in the world." Don sidles up, tieless in a navy suit (lucky bastard), and Will cheers, "Donny! We've got Kavalan."

"The Taiwanese stuff?" Don asks, clearly interested.

"Taiwanese?" Jim makes a face.

"Tastes better than the stuff grown in the green hills of Scotland," Brian Williams assures and, since he's always been kind of intimidated by him, Jim accepts the proferred tumbler. The other two clink glasses, and he awkwardly joins in. "What do you do, Jimmy?" Brian Williams asks.

"Jim's our new director of international news. Just came back from a posting in Ankara."

"What brought you back?"

"I just got married, actually," he smiles.

"Mazel tov," Brian Williams says, knocking back the drink. "Will — It's been an honor." He gets up to leave.

"You as well, sir," Will holds up his drink. Brian Williams nods at the two of them, and leaves.

"Nice party, sir," Don says to Will.

"Blame Leona for this mess," Will says. "Now, where's Neal? Between your marriage, his engagement, my retirement, and your promotion, we need some cigars."

"You got a promotion?" Jim asks.

Don winces. "He's drunk."

"Merry. I am vivacious and merry," Will corrects, clearly on top of the damn world. "Now, come on, where's Neal, where's the balcony, and where are my fucking cigars?"

"I've got the cigars, there's Neal, Charlie's that way, balcony over there," Don says. "Let's go."

"We ride!" Will proclaims, pushing through the crowd. It takes them a while to collect the others and get through the crowd — people keep stopping them to congratulate him. He sees Sloan and Mac talking to Mika Brzezinski, and thinks he gets a brief glimpse of Maggie, but he's not sure. Finally the humid August air hits him in the face. It's refreshing after the artificial cool of the air conditioning.

"What are we doing out here, exactly?" Neal asks, dumbfounded.

"We, Sampat, are celebrating like men do. With cigars." Will slaps a Stogie into Neal's palm. "We've got two marriages, two retirements, a promotion—"

"You're really going to need to stop saying that," Don says, adding about eight extra 'e's to the word 'really.'

"You got a promotion?" Neal asks. "Like, after the new job four months ago?"

"No," Don says emphatically. "I most certainly did not."

"Yet," Will snorts.

"You are drunk," Don says, yanking out a lighter. Jim wonders where it came from, because Don doesn't smoke. "Smoke something so you sober up, k?"

"Is Sloan coming back to ACN?" Neal asks. Don inexplicably just folds his hands on the railing and puts his head down.

"No, Leona decided to make him Prince William to Reese's Prince Charles," Will says. Now that's interesting.

"Ok, people have got to stop using that analogy," Don cuts in, bopping into a standing position "And no she has not, because nothing has been decided." He puts his head down again.

Neal snorts. "Do you have to wear one of those stupid red sashes now? And the funny medals for being an honorary soldier? The white gloves?"

"Anyways. There are many congratulations in order," Will interrupts. "So to Neal, to Jim, to Don—"

"What the hell are we toasting Don for?" Neal asks again. "If he says he hasn't got a promotion —"

"—To Charlie, and to Will," Don interrupts. "You two have set a great example of how to be a true newsman, and we continue to try and live up to those ideals daily. I can't say we won't ding up your car sometimes, but we're honored you gave us the keys. And to Neal and Jim — 'adventure' won't really cover marriage, even a little. But when you find that person, it's pretty special. I'm happy the two of you both recognized that and grabbed it while you can."

The quintet hangs out on the balcony for a while, passing around a bottle of bourbon Charlie swiped as they josh Neal with advice for the upcoming wedding. Eventually, though, both Will and Charlie are lured back inside by a frantic Mac, and Don asks, "So when's Alicia coming into town? Looking forward to meeting her."

"Sunday," he says, then adds bashfully, "Next week's the anniversary of our first date, so I'm gonna do something nice."

Don shakes his head. "That's amazing. One year since the first date, huh?" he laughs, but it's a loaded, slightly bitter laugh.

Jim's a little confused, since Don and Sloan dated for just ten months before (for all intents and purposes) eloping. "I married Alicia because I was in love with her," he says, his voice carefully measured. He's felt defensive about this for weeks, though besides Mac's reaction, everyone else had been supportive or even excited. "Same as you and Sloan."

"I didn't marry Sloan because I loved her," Don laughs again, but not unkindly. He seems off tonight, beyond off, actually — closer to losing it. "It wasn't a romantic decision."

"Then why'd you marry her?" Jim asks.

"I wanted a life with her," he says simply. "Speaking of, I should go find her."

"Good luck, Duke of Cambridge," Jim calls after him, feeling petty for an indeterminate reason.

"Fuck you," Don sing-songs back, without acrimony.

Jim turns to Neal as Don exists, mystified. "What the hell? Was that?" There was nothing particularly dickish about Don's remarks, but it was just … bizarre.

Neal shrugs. "He and Sloan are having a tough time, Maggie says. He's just taking it out on you."

"So they're … splitting up?" Jim is honestly confused, because seriously, what is going on with everyone? Neal has this put-upon air of a sage that is maddening and almost condescending. "And what the hell — because I wanted a life with her?" he puts a mocking tone on to mimic Don's voice (he does a poor job at it, he can admit).

"I didn't say that," Neal says. "Don means — think about Mac and Will. He loved her from the minute he met her, but it took eight years to get down the aisle."

"Yeah, because she, you know …" he refuses to say anything ill about Mac.

"Exactly. It took him eight years to realize that none of that shit mattered, that he wanted to have the good and the bad and everything in between with her. That he wanted to be married. Love, sure, that was a given. That's what Don's talking about. That the rest of it matter in a marriage. You know."

"That is love," Jim insists.

Neal sighs. "But it's more than that."

Jim sucks in a deep breath. "You know, that's all well and good, getting married after eight years when you've been through shit together. But just because you've been through some tough times doesn't mean that it's always going to be smooth sailing ahead, that nothing will break you, that 'having a life' is any different from being 'in love.' That it predicts how the relationship will turn out any better. Things can still break you. Life can still suck. You can lose a kid, for instance. You can kill your own damn kid." He sets down his drink, very gently, because he's afraid that otherwise he'll smash it. He's sick of this bullshit, the unspoken assumptions from his coworkers and old friends about Alicia and his marriage to her. He sees Don and Neal's point — god, he sees it, he gets it — but it doesn't devalue his relationship.

"Shit — Jim — I'm sorry." Neal seems to realize he fucked up a little. "You didn't — you didn't kill her. You know that, right?"

"It's fine," Jim says. "But I need to wake up early, to buy new bowls tomorrow, so I'm going to go. Say good-night to Mariah."

"Jim —" Neal calls, but he doesn't turn around.

He's trying to make an Irish exit, but Mac catches him. "Jim! Will says Alicia is coming to town this week?"

"Yeah, Sunday," he says tiredly.

"Wonderful," she says. "Will and I — and Don and Sloan — would like to take you two and Neal and Mariah out to Le Bernadin. On Friday, to celebrate. How does that sound?" She smiles. She's really trying hard. He appreciates it.

He smiles thinly and tries not to look too pained. "That sounds great, Mac."

She beams. "Excellent. I'll make the reservation."

He cannot escape quickly enough.

But all the fears and insecurities and irritations are dashed away on Sunday when Alicia breezes off the plane in a white sleeveless Oxford and fitted black capris. She yanks her oversized sunglasses off of her face with a flourish, wrapping her legs around his hips and peppering his face with kisses right by the baggage carousels. "I missed you," she says, practically squealing, and he clutches the nape of her neck to kiss her more deeply.

"I missed you too," he says, and she beams and loops her arm through his.

"I'm so excited to see everything. And I haven't been to New York in so long. Oh! And I get to see your apartment."

"Our apartment," he corrects, and she grins.

"You know, I always read about people christening their apartments … Think that's something you'd be into?"

"Hell yes," he grins.

"I have so much to tell you," she prattles. "I met the most interesting man when my mom was in Ankara with me, I meant to tell you. He works with this fantastic NGO, and they're working with this Silicon Valley start-up to deliver portable incubators and battery-powered, transportable ventilators. It's an amazing advance. They're solar-powered, so they're perfect for the dessert. I need to shoot him an email, actually, he said that we should be in touch. Maybe he has a job; wouldn't that be great?"

"That'd be awesome," he agrees.

They barely make it in the door before she's unbuttoning his shirt, springing a button free in her haste. She's intent on her plan to christen the apartment — they don't make it out of the living room. It's life-affirming, really, to have her back.

Later, much later, they're lying in their bed when she begins to tap a pattern out on his chest. "So how are you liking the job?" she asks. "And how is it, being back? Tell me everything."

"It's good," he says, and it is. "Being back in the New York office is like … riding a bike."

"Or sex?" she teases.

"Or sex," he agrees, ghosting a tickle up her ribcage and making her flinch. "Muscle memory." He presses a kiss on her collarbone. "And it's good to work with everyone again."

"How MacKenzie? And her daughter?"

"They're good, yeah. Nora seems to be adjusting. And we just celebrated Will's retirement on Friday. I wish you had been there; I drank bourbon with Brian Williams. Oh, and she wants us all to do dinner on Friday. She's made a reservation at Le Bernadin."

"Le Bernadin?"

"Yeah. Celebrating."

She giggles, and the way her hair frames her face is almost intoxicating. "Alright then."

The rest of the week passes quickly. It's a little weird, sharing space with Alicia in this city. It's the-same-but-just-different, the way so much in New York is these days. He'd read once, in a science-fiction book, about a man who had had a skin transplant. He looked the same, he looked fine, but everything just felt both stretched and snug, just different from how it used to be, there were unexpected tugs when something didn't work quite the way he expected it to. That's how New York and Alicia in New York both were.

Tuesday, he comes home to his furniture rearranged (he fucks her in the kitchen that night, right on the IKEA island that she moved to under the window). Wednesday, he comes home so late that she's left a plate of pizza inside a pizza box on the counter — she's in bed. Thursday, she's completely torn up the living room and is doing yoga in the middle of the carpet (he pulls her into the bathroom and they have sex there).

"I went to go talk to Kelsey at Save the Children today," she says as they eat in bed Thai later. "They're starting a new program in Lebanon and Jordan to work with Syrian refugees. And I have a phone conversation with Matt Bandolino, in the Washington offices for the Peace Corps. They need a country coordinator in Botswana."

"Anything in their New York offices?" he jokes.

She quirks her head to the side. "You know they don't have an office in New York City."

The next day, since they have their big dinner that night, he surprises her by leaving work at four, as soon as his segments for the evening shows are wrapped. She's in the small office when he gets home, painting the walls a moddish mint.

"Green walls?" he asks, amused.

"It's called 'pool green.' It was Pantone's color of 2016."

"Did it get a crown and a bouquet of flowers, too?"

She laughs and hits him lightly. "It's a paint color. I like it. Don't you like it? So much better than beige. Honestly, everything here is some variation of white. You need more color or people will think you're Erik Satie."

"He's pretty underappreciated," he says, moving in to kiss her.

"Watch out for the paint cans," she gasps, laughing, as he pushes her down onto the tiny couch.

"Come on," he says, much later, kissing her shoulder before getting up and tugging her hand. "We should probably get ready. We've got to be at the restaurant in an hour."

She rouses, catlike. "Ah yes, Le Bernardin," she mocks the name with a perfect French pronunciation.

"Yeah, Le Bernardin. It's one of the best restaurants in the city."

"Exactly," she kisses him on the way to the bathroom. "Are you joining?"

"Exactly what?"

She shrugs as she turns on the shower and waits for it to heat up. "It means, of course your friends would go there on a Friday night, just because, for dinner, you know? It's amusing. Ironic, the way life is sometimes."

"We're going because Neal proposed, and we got married, and it's one of Mac's favorite restaurants."

Her eyes widen, as if to say duh. "I know. I'm agreeing. Why are you hounding me?"

"I don't know, it sounds like you're being ironic and I'm not sure about what!"

"I'm teasing, god, don't be so defensive. Yes, I think it's a little funny that my husband's friends think that a $250 tasting menu for a table of eight is a normal activity for a Friday night. Last year I was eating beans in a hut outside Ankara. Two years before that I was eating $2 pizza after frat parties in I'm going to a restaurant with three Michelin stars with Will McAvoy. That's what I'm … commenting on. I'm excited, I am, it's just … funny in the way life is funny sometimes," she repeats, shivering because it's freezing, and steps into the shower.

He follows her in, helps maneuver her piles of wavy hair under the spray. "Alright. You're right, it is. But Will is great, he really, really is."

"He is?" she asks skeptically. "Since there's enough Page Six blurbs about him being an ass to fill a phone book."

"First off, most of those are a few years old. But yeah, he's kind of … temperamental," he trails off, suddenly worried about her holding her own against his very opinionated old friends. "And Sloan and Mac can both be a bit intense, and actually, so can Don, he's just … intense in a louder way sometimes. Although Mac can be kind of loud too. But they're all great! Especially Neal … Neal's great. Sometimes a little snarky, but great. And Mariah's awesome."

She stares at him as she lathers shampoo into her hair. "So you're telling me that one and a half of these people are going to be chill, and the one is the one you just met? Wow, you're really selling an evening with your old friends." She emphasizes old, making it a double entendre, but it's also pretty clear she's joking. Still —

"They're not actually that old. I mean, you're not like going out with your grandparents."

She rolls her eyes, clearly wanting out of this conversation. "No, but Don and Sloan are what, at least in their late thirties? I saw her show today and she's gorgeous but she's also not exactly young. And Mac's got to be in her mid-40s, the way you talk about her. And I googled Will, he's 58."

He actually has no idea how old they all are. He thinks he went to Sloan's thirty-third birthday? Did they even have kids then? He's not sure. But — "Neal. Is 30. Why is this a big deal?"

"It's not, but that's still a third of my lifetime older than me," she points out, standing on her tiptoes to kiss him. "This restaurant's in Midtown right?"

"Yeah, West 51st."

"I think some of my friends from college were planning on meeting around 11 at this place in Hell's Kitchen. I haven't seen them since I left for the Peace Corps. Maybe we go there after? They're going to this bar where you play skeeball, and then your score determines the price of your drinks." She shrugs on the dress she chose.

That sounds exhausting. "Sure. If you want."

"Great," she smiles, twirling. "How is this for a Meet the Parents dress?"

"Alicia…"

"Relax, Jim, I'm joking," she giggles, then cocks her head. "You need to calm down. Tonight's going to be fine. It'll be fun."

"I know," he runs his hands down her arms. "You look really nice," he adds before kissing her.

They grab a cab and head to the restaurant. They're led immediately to a table in the center of the main dining room, where Mac and Will are sitting. Will's in a sharp suit and Mac's in a black and white dress that is 'dramatic,' as the women might say. It's gorgeous, though.

"Jim!" she exclaims happily, jumping up to hug him.

"Hey, Mac," he smiles, since it's nice to be liked by Mac again. "This is Alicia. Alicia, this is Will and MacKenzie McAvoy."

"Nice to meet you," Alicia extends her hand. "Jim speaks so highly of both of you."

"Does he, now?" Mac says, barely able to contain herself. "Well, we love Jim. And are so happy he's back in New York. With you!"

"Do we want to sit?" Jim says, pulling out a chair for Alicia.

"Alicia, I love your dress," Mac remarks.

"Thanks, I got it at this amazing boutique in Prague for like ten dollars," she smiles. "Yours is lovely. I love the Art Deco accents. Where'd you get it?"

Mac plasters a tight smile on her face. "Lanvin. Vintage."

"Oh," Alicia wrinkles her brow before smiling. "It's really great."

"Sorry we're late," Neal says, as he and Mariah appear.

"Traffic was a nightmare," Mariah says.

"You live like five blocks from here," Jim points out.

"Dude, that was code for newly engaged," Neal shakes his head, and Alicia laughs, instantly charmed.

"I'm Alicia," she smiles. "It's awesome to meet you."

"Neal Sampat, this is my fiance Mariah," Neal introduces, placing his hand on the small of her back. He grins widely at the term fiance.

"And don't worry about being late, we're still waiting on Don and Sloan," Mac reassures.

"That's weird. Sloan's obnoxiously punctual," Jim says, because it's true. "The woman is a German train schedule." One time she berated him for making her lose 17 seconds on a commercial break. He'd never filled in for her producer again.

"Don's half-sister is their usual nighttime babysitter and they've been having some issues with her. I imagine it's Lily-related again," Mac says. "Bread? And let's order some wine, please."

Sure enough, ten minutes later, Sloan and Don dash in, Sloan in a ridiculous pair of heels. "So sorry," Don says, as they take the remaining seats.

"Lily?" Mac says sympathetically.

"Yeah — she thought she'd have enough time to grab dinner on the Lower East Side at seven and make it to our place by eight."

"Where do you live?" Jim asks.

"Oh, still the same place — 88th and Riverside. Tony Stark's car wouldn't have helped her case."

"This is, what? The third time she's messed up in two months? She showed up drunk on Fourth of July. You guys. She needs to be more responsible," Mac chides.

"What do you want me to do?" Don shoots back. "She's a freelance 'designer' interning for an artist and working in a coffee shop in Brooklyn as she 'finds' herself; she needs the cash."

"You're busy parents with real jobs, you need reliable childcare."

"Well, first off, she's my baby sister, I can't just stop hiring her without some messy, convoluted, and hellish phone calls with her mom and my mom and my brother. And second, she's twenty-three, I'm not sure she knows the definitions of reliable and responsible," Don says, and Jim sits back a little. Don doesn't seem to notice the faux pas but Sloan does, pursing her lips to keep from laughing and looking away. Neal snorts outright into his water.

"So, Don and Sloan, this is my wife, Alicia." An oh shit look finally crosses Don's face, and Sloan starts snickering.

"It's great to meet you," Sloan finally says, recovering. "Welcome to New York."

"Thanks," she says, then extends her hand to Don. "Don't worry. I turned 24 last month." Her smile is faux-casual, and it puts him a bit on edge.

"Happy belated birthday," Don says with humility, recovering nicely.

"So Alicia, you just finished the Peace Corps? My younger sister Sutton spent two years in Botswana with the organization. She's back in Namibia right now, doing a medical residency in infectious diseases," Sloan smiles. Jim nods, impressed. He didn't know that.

"Oh, that's so cool," Alicia says. "I worked with schools, helping set up them up but also teaching students. I was primarily based in a Syrian refugee camp, but also got to travel to towns with less developed systems. But I also really liked working with the kids — I taught the youngest students, five- and six-year-olds."

"That's such a great age," Don smiles, recovering. "Our oldest is five in February."

"Yeah, it was really great to watch them grow and develop. Something new every day," she smiles.

"And so, what next?" Don asks innocently, and Jim can see Sloan shift subtly to squeeze Don's thigh.

"Right now, it's a little … up-in-the-air," she admits. "I mean, I'm happy to be in New York; when I lived in the States I lived in New Jersey, so it's kind of home. But I'd like to get a job that allows me to work in the field as well. It's important work and it's so much more exciting than sitting in some office, you know. I just love the feeling of being somewhere new and getting to do something that really makes a difference. And it's appalling how these countries and these people are just shunted aside by most of the political conversation and a pretty solid portion of American philanthropy and foreign policy."

"You don't see the value in the United States' position, given that it's pretty well-established that aid and NGO support to governments and through official channels makes little difference if the political and economic structures of the receiving countries aren't stable enough to support reform?" Sloan asks. Oh shit. This is bad, because Sloan's father has a freaking Nobel Prize for proving this fact and proposing alternatives.

"There are structures we can use to support them stabilizing."

"U.S. foreign policy has a pretty abysmal record of military and diplomatic interference, in that top-down, Western-driven interventions usually lead to takeovers by militaristic dictators who use oppression and fear tactics in order to stay in power, which makes most of their citizens poor, miserable, and leads to the need for refugee camps," Will says. Double-shit, because Will has a Pulitzer for reporting on that.

He looks at Mac, who says, "Oh no, I'm good. Bread?" with an arched eyebrow and thin, straight lips.

"I mean, I'm not saying it's not tough," Alicia says tentatively. She knows that she's waded into something but doesn't quite know what. "But the fact is that we're the richest nation in the world and we've got a duty to other nations, where citizens and refugees are living in deplorable conditions."

Don cocks his head. "Sorry — what about the Americans who are living in deplorable conditions, constructed by their elected officials and the companies they work for?" Triple shit. That was the topic of a Peabody-winning doc that Don put together at NBC.

"I think Alicia's just trying to say that we still keep trying. We don't give up, and we keep trying to make a difference," Jim cuts in.

"Yes. Exactly." But she side-eyes him, presumably, he intuits, for not stepping in earlier. Though he knows for a fact he would have gotten yelled at for stepping in sooner, if he had.

"You know, with the rise of social media, Will — don't roll your eyes — we actually have an opportunity for more organic, on-the-ground revolution driven by the people in whatever country seeks reforms. The State Department has started tapping into those networks but could do a much better job. At work we're currently mapping different social network in various countries; if we can find linkages and get that information into the right hands it can be a powerful organizing tool," Neal points out.

The wine arrives, is poured. "A toast," Will proposes. "To Alicia and Jim — congratulations on joining the league of surprise weddings. As Sloan and Don and Mac and I can tell you, it's a pretty good club to be in. And Neal and Mariah — congratulations on your engagement, and thank you for actually sitting down and planning a wedding. Pretty sure Mac would've gone nuts if one more person eloped on her."

"Oh, bugger off," Mac rolls her eyes. "But yes, please don't elope. I want to go to someone's wedding with more than a day's notice. To Jim, Alicia, Neal, and Mariah."

The rest of the dinner and the dessert goes smoothly, and they separate around 10:30, as Sloan and Don and Will and Mac race back to relieve babysitters. "Do you want to grab another drink?" Mariah asks.

"We're actually heading to this really crazy skeeball lounge in Hells Kitchen. Do you want to come along?" Alicia asks. "I have a few friends from college hanging out there, and I haven't seen them in years."

Mariah and Neal exchange a look. "Yeah, there's this funk bassist we really like playing at a bar a few blocks over. I think we'll head there," Mariah finally says.

"Of course. It was great to meet you," Alicia says, hugging them quickly before hailing a cab.

"See ya, man," he says, giving Neal a hug. "Mariah," he hugs her quickly before jumping in the cab. "So I think that went really well," he says, shutting the door.

"Are you kidding?" Alicia snorts, yanking a cigarette out of her purse and rolling down the windows.

"No smoking in the car," the cabbie says, and she rolls her eyes before putting it away.

"You didn't think it went well?"

"I mean, your friends are in love with how smart they are. They're snobs."

"What? Because they pushed back on what you said about U.S. aid policy?"

"Yes," she says. "Well, not just that. I get that they had a point. But that wasn't a debate, it was an interrogation."

"What? Ok, first off, they know what the fuck they're talking about. Sloan's dad has a Nobel Prize for his work in the economics of the Third World, and she's regularly cited on issues of governance, economic policy, and poverty. And Don's won a ton of prizes for his broadcasts on domestic race and class politics. And Will knows basically every Secretary of State since Alexander Haig. Hell, Mac's dad is a member of the British Empire for service as an ambassador."

"That's what I'm saying. They're in love with how smart they are."

"No, they actually are that smart. You get into a conversation on any issue with them, whether they agree with you or disagree with you, they're going to debate you, to push your thinking and to see if there's something new they haven't considered. They're that smart."

"Then they can be that smart and be smug about it. They weren't debating; they were grilling me."

"I think you're being a little paranoid …"

"No, I'm being right," she says. "I mean, I don't really care. I married you; not your friends. But god they were terrible."

He rolls his eyes and sits back. "I swear to you, that was not their intention. That's just how they have conversations. What about Neal?"

"Oh, I liked him. Let's get a booze brunch with him and Mariah when I'm here."

"You know, when you say, 'while you're here,' I'm not sure what you mean."

She shifts. "I mean, I need to job hunt. But, babe, I'd like to be back overseas. You know that. I'm not sure why that surprises you. Even when we were living in Turkey, I would be traveling back and forth if I landed in, say, the Congo."

"Right, but there weren't tons of NGOs based in Ankara the way there are in New York. And I was also a lot more location-independent when we were in Turkey. I mean, if you got a job at the UN or at an NGO that had you traveling to the Congo or to the Sudan for a week every month but then getting to be here, with me, in New York … wouldn't that be the best of both worlds?"

She looks a little confused. "I mean, that would be an option, for sure." She leans forward to speak to the cabbie. "Excuse me? Can you actually head to Columbus Circle? Sorry. Thanks."

"You want to go home?" he asks.

"Yeah," she says. "I'm exhausted."

"You don't want to see your friends?"

"Well, if I'm staying in New York, I'll see them plenty," she says, sighing as she leans back against the bench.

"No, let's go see them — excuse me, sir, turn around —"

"No. I'm tired. Jim, I'm not mad. I just want to go to bed."

They're lying in bed thirty minutes later, both flat on their backs, not touching. They both know the other is awake, but neither moves to say anything. Finally, he can't take it. "Alright. Why do I feel like the bad guy? I wanted you to meet my friends; you didn't particularly like them, fine. Great. Whatever. I married you, not my friends. Why does it feel like it's a problem?"

She sighs, and shifts to face him. "Does this feel harder than it was in Ankara?" She motions between them.

"What? No. It feels different. It's weird. We're in a new city. New jobs."

"New job," she corrects. "Jim, you didn't move here and expect me to just move here too, and get a job in the city, and move to a brownstone in Brooklyn with you in a year and have a baby in two, did you?"

"What? No," he says. He didn't, but he doesn't believe himself the way he says that.

"Because I was clear — I love working abroad. Even if Sloan and Will think it's stupid and fruitless. It has meaning to me. It's my job, it's me. And I thought — you were traveling so much, I would probably be traveling, I didn't think if it was between Ankara and the Congo or the Congo and New York it would make a difference. But it seems to be."

"I love that you're passionate about what you do," he says, honestly.

"But you don't love that I want to work abroad."

"I mean, of course not! Can you blame me, for wanting to see you when we're married?"

"No, I can be mad if you're resenting my career."

"I'm — I'm not. I don't," he says quickly. "Do I wish that you found something that based you in New York? Yes. I think, at least part of the time, we need to be in the same city to make this work. But we're married. I want you to be happy. If it's you working abroad and us flying to London to see each other every few weeks, fine. I want you to be happy, and fulfilled, and have a job you love. We'll make it work. I promise."

She bites her lip, then leans forward and kisses him chastely. Then she tucks herself into his side and closes her eyes. He inhales her scent deeply. He's getting better at this, he thinks, this marriage thing. He couldn't stand making her hate him. He's had enough relationships end in wild, gasoline-soaked motorcycle crashes to know not to ruin things again.

He takes another deep breath, and tries to fall asleep.


	10. Mac

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for the fantastic reception to the last chapter, y'all! It really helped me crank this next one out, and your feedback helped me hone a few things to hopefully make them more clear now. I'm hopeful that having the next few weeks off from school/work will lead to more productivity, and even a few more oneshots for "Hearts." And, to those worried about the lack of Will and Maggie - I hear you! Hopefully that will change soon. Will is the hardest for me to write, which is why he's not featured super-prominently, but I'm trying to write at least one point from his perspective. And Maggie will come swinging back with a venegeance soon. (And, if you think the last sentence contradicts an earlier chapter, go back and read very carefully :) ).
> 
> If you're reading, I always appreciate hearing your thoughts. Thanks so much to all who have read/reviewed.
> 
> The problem is not merely one of Woman and Career, Woman and the Home, Woman and Independence.It is more basically: how to remain whole in the midst of the distractions of life; how to remain balanced, no matter what centrifugal forces tend to pull one off center; how to remain strong, no matter what shocks come in at the periphery and tend to crack the hub of the wheel."
> 
> -Anne Morrow Lindbergh

August 31

"Nora, please eat all of your samosa," Mac says, for the third time. She's positive that half the reason her daughter is such a picky eater is that Mac's terrible at preparing traditional Pakistani dishes, which Nora frequently requests in a dialect that she and Will have dubbed Urduglish.

"No. No more. Tummy aches," Nora says. Max Keefer had taught her that word. "Cookie?"

"Of course not, you did not finish your samosa." Nora shakes her head and gets up from the island counter.

"Cookie!" Nora shouts, throwing the samosa into the sink. "Samosa no. Samosa bad."

"You cannot have the cookie, no, you did not finish your food." Tears threaten to overflow her eyelids, and she gasps in a lungful of air, a clear sign of a tantrum on the horizon. "But you may have a granola bar," she compromises, pushing it at her.

"Where Daddy?" she asks, sullen but hopeful, as she takes the bar. Mac has the distinct feeling she just got played.

"He's at work. He'll be home soon. We're going to go to your madarassaa, your school, today. We're going to meet your teacher, your new ustaad, like how Miss Amira was your ustaad. This will be exciting, right?"

School was starting on Wednesday. Sloan had gotten Nora into the 92 Street Y preschool with no problem (Sloan's ambivalent to ignorant about most Manhattan Mommy stuff, but she's assiduous, ambitious and smart, so she'd be damned if Max went to anything but the best preschool in the city. One call from her had gotten Will McAvoy's orphaned, adopted daughter in quickly. Personally, Mac would have preferred the International Preschools at the UN), but no matter how many times Mac explained school, she was certain that the entire concept would trigger an episode for Nora. Again.

Nora has been with them for almost two months, and Mac is amazed at how quickly she has acquired English. They had found an Urdu-based playgroup through some UN contacts, and Mac found she remembered key conversational phrases, both of which were helping. But she still has nightmares, still turns sullen frequently, still has meltdowns and resorts to tantrums when she is confused and overwhelmed. They'd taken to letting her fall asleep in their bed and stay there all night, which all the books and Sloan discouraged. They hadn't had sex in weeks. All of this was completely expected, but nevertheless taxing. Mac was convinced school would make Nora feel abandoned all over again.

"Naeema'n Arjan a' madarassaa?" she asks, referencing her two friends from the orphanage.

Her heart falters. "No, but Max is. And you'll make new friends."

"Mac? I'm home," Will calls as the elevators open.

"Daddy!" Nora shrieks and runs to him. Mac smiles. Nora became a daddy's girl in a span of hours, which is a source of relief to Mac. Will had been so worried about adopting her that she had worried they would not bond, that he would be preemptively, protectively, distant and surly. Thankfully the opposite had happened. He's working much, much saner hours, now that he's prepping for his show, and it's odd, both of them in this domestic groove.

"Hello, shehzadi," he says, using the Urdu word for princess and kissing her face as he holds her under her armpits. "How was today?"

"Mommy and I go park with Nadia," she says. "We eat popsicles." Nadia is the British-born daughter of an Iranian diplomat whom they've hired to be Nora's nanny. She speaks Urdu and Arabic with ease, has just graduated Barnard, and knew Sloan's nanny, Cristina. When Mac returns to work full-time next week, she'll be staying with Nora in the afternoons and on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They had been lucky to find her. "We go to madarassaa now. You go."

"Yes, shehzadi, we're going to your new school now. We get to meet your new teacher and see your playground and your classroom." He swings her easily onto his hip and leans forward to kiss Mac. "How was your morning?"

"Good," she says, pasting a smile on. It has been good, but exhausting. She is so happy to get back to work next week. She is not cut out for the constant negotiations and questions and dalliances of a three-year-old. "Is the car waiting?"

"Yeah, Kenny's downstairs," he says. "Ready to go, princess?" he asks.

"Ready, Freddie," she chimes. Max Keefer taught her that phrase.

"Here, let's brush your hair first, Nora, and you need to wash your hands," Mac says, feeling a bit like a nag. She knows that Nora's already in — they've paid the year's tuition — but she still wants to make a good impression. Parenting thus far has been a constant tug against a threatening current. She's not actually sure if the Manhattan-mother set is as cutthroat as it seems to be in books — and she'll barely be participating in it anyways, due to her job — but she still feels like she needs to look over her shoulder, that she's doing it wrong and doesn't even know it. MacKenzie McHale McAvoy has never done anything badly. She has always done things fearlessly. But she's terrified by the vague, undefined specter of simply messing up with Nora, or even looking like she's messing up (the sad truth is, she's a mid-forties career woman who still melts Tupperware in the microwave. She's not exactly a strong candidate for success here). At her edict, though, Nora makes a face.

"I got it," Will says, and he sets her on the stool and helps her wash her hands, distracting her enough that Mac is able to run a comb through her hair. She looks very cute, in a gray Boden dress with cap sleeves, a hot pink Peter Pan collar, and a colored-pencil print. She's also got pink leggings, trimmed in lace, and white sandals on to compliment the outfit. Mac's pretty proud of herself for putting together something that says 'school' the way this does. She still hasn't gotten the hang of getting clips into Nora's hair so that they'll stay — Sloan has tried to show her a million times — so she slides a headband on too and hope that will keep everything neat.

"I see Max?" Nora says hopefully as they head into the elevator.

"Not today darling," Mac says brightly. "But we'll see them all tomorrow, alright?"

"The way she talks about this kid, you'd think they'll end up married," Will rolls his eyes. "I refuse to end up related to Don Keefer."

She laughs, because that's simply absurd. "You want to marry Max, Nora?" she asks.

"What marry?"

"It's when you're very big and tall and you sleep in the same bed as Max," she says.

"I is big and tall," she says, indignant. "I'm —" Forgetting the word, she holds up her fingers. "This."

"Yes. You're three, and you are right. You're very big and tall," Mac smiles fondly.

They get into the car and head up the East Side. Mac passed the building a million times when she and her parents lived at 86th and Lexington, had gone in for plenty of book readings in her early twenties. It's older, brown, with two flags flying out front. It's inconspicuous, yet stately. She's seized with terror.

Will slides out first and then she helps Nora down. Nora grabs Will's hand and skips as they walk in. Kenny pulls the car somewhere. Inside they give their names to the gentleman behind the desk, and a few moments later, a petite, very young woman comes down to meet them. She looks barely old enough to have graduated from Ramaz and has Tory Burch flats and shiny, straight hair.

"Hi," she smiles, extending her hand. "I'm Gabriella Klein, Dr. Grubman's assistant. I'm pleased to meet you both. And hello, my dear. You must be Nora." Nora buries her head in Will's hip.

"Sorry," Mac says. "She's quite shy."

"Not a problem," Gabriella smiles. "She's new to the States. She seems like quite the brave little girl!" She chirps, leading them to the elevator. "Now, we're very excited to have Nora join our three-year-old class on Wednesday. She'll be coming Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, correct?"

"This year, yes," Mac smiles.

"Wonderful. And who will be dropping Nora off? One of you, or her nanny?"

"I will," Will says.

"Great. Now, we just ask — this has become a problem in recent years — that you have your driver circle the block during drop-offs and pickups. We've found that it makes the situation quite untenable, and we've unfortunately had to give some students less-than-stellar kindergarten recommendations due to parents' unwillingness to comply." She smiles. Mac's jaw drops. This is a thing?

"Now, once you arrive, just bring her straight in and up to the sixth floor. Abe, at the front desk, never forgets a face. You'll sign in on the sixth floor." Like magic, the doors slide open, revealing a wide, welcoming hallway with cubbies snaking along the sides. It's older, but exceptionally well-renovated. "This area is usually covered in artwork, but we let the children add as the year goes on. We believe that it's important for children to build their own environments, see themselves reflected in their space, and be able to take pride in their accomplishments," she smiles.

"The classrooms for the 2's and 3's are along the right down the green hallway, the 4's and 5's are down this center blue hallway, and administrative offices and specials are to the left, down the yellow. Classes are divided by the number of days attended, and students who come for three days a week — our Monday-Wednesday-Friday pupils, like Nora — split a classroom and teachers with our Tuesday-Thursday students. I'll take you on a tour in a bit, but right now Dr. Grubman would like to meet with you," she smiles. She leads them down the yellow hallway, and into a small outer office — outfitted with a single glass-topped desk and a Mac laptop — and knocks on an inner door.

The door swings open quickly, and another very petite, albeit much older, woman walks out. Mac feels like a leper-giant. This woman wears a blue caridgan, tailored mint-green capris, and Tory Burch flats. Her dark hair has no gray strands, and is immaculately blown out. "Mr. and Mrs. McAvoy, welcome. Dr. Elaine Grubman," she smiles. "We're so happy to have you join the 92nd Street Y family. And this must be Nora," she beams, kneeling down, and this time Nora smiles back. Mac can tell why this woman got into child psychology. "Sloan Keefer has just said some absolutely wonderful things about you all, and of course we just love Max. And we're so excited that we'll have his sisters next fall as well!" She welcomes them into her office, which is full of soft toys. Nora immediately dives for them; when Mac tries to stop her, Dr. Grubman shakes her head. "We adults will talk. The toys are there for her."

It's an extensive, 30-minute conversation, first a simple getting-to-know you, followed by an interrogation about what their Parenting Beliefs are. Dr. Grubman wraps up by saying, "Wonderful! Now, I'm going to spend some time getting to know Nora, and Gabriella will walk you through our policies, procedures, and collect some information from you."

"We're leaving Nora?" Mac says. "We … we rarely do that." They've done it once, when they took Alicia and Jim out to dinner, and it caused even more grief that evening.

"Mac, c'mon, she'll be fine. She's here three times a week from now on," Will says, tugging her hand. Dr. Grubman smiles, but says nothing else, and Mac slowly realizes that it's not up for debate. Dr. Grubman joins Nora on the floor, then Will leads her out.

It's a blur of paperwork, but soon Nora is skipping out, excitedly talking about her playtime with Dr. Elaine. They take a tour of the building, meet Nora's teachers — Ms. Olivia (who Max had last year, Mac remembers) and Ms. Corrie, who is new. Nora loves them too, and hugs them enthusiastically. They leave, and Nora is still talking about school.

"I'm beginning to think that Nora loves everyone else more than she loves me," Mac announces glumly to Sloan the next Saturday, as they pick at sandwiches at Espresso's Italian Market and Sloan prattles on about the plans she's made for Don's surprise birthday party in three weeks. It's Labor Day, and they're all staying at Will and Mac's place in Sag Harbor to relax and spend time on the beach. They hadn't even bothered to invite Jim or Maggie, knowing what memories it would invoke for all involved.

Sloan, dressed in navy shorts and a gray sweatshirt from Benetton, snorts. "Don't be paranoid, Kenzie. I'm thinking that Don and I should buy a place in the Hamptons."

She laughs now. "For his birthday? Way too big. And don't be stupid; you've spent years talking about how much you hate the Hamptons. And I'm serious. Don't joke."

Sloan crunches a fry. "Ok. I still think it's ridiculous, because I've seen you with her, but why? I'm indulging you here."

"Because … Will makes her laugh more. And Dr. Grubman made her smile within a minute or two! She loves all her new teachers. She'd prefer to play with Nadia. She'd rather talk to the other mothers at her playgroup than me, since they speak Urdu. And she likes your house better because Max and Emma and Anna are there."

"Kenzie, all of this sounds normal. And more importantly, that she's happy. She wants to play with other kids. She is ready to go to school. She's not panicking at the thought of being with her nanny. I mean, crap, Kenzie, if I was concerned about every time my kids liked their nanny or their teachers or Don better than me, I wouldn't get out of bed most mornings."

"Don't be silly; your children love you." She has seen the three children interact with Sloan; more importantly, she has seen Sloan interact with them. She anticipates their every move. Is able to read their moods like they're a stock report. Counters every misbehavior with firmness and love. She'd had plenty of difficult, exhausted days, particularly after the twins were born, but Sloan had a grace and an ease with her children that Mac envied.

"I know that. But Don is more patient and less strict, Cristina is always artistic and energetic, and Keiko's a freaking baby whisperer. But I'm mom, and … that's enough. At the end of the day, you're a special person to her, and the rest of the shit doesn't matter." She pauses. "Look. You're going back to work in a few days. Maybe that'll help."

"How the fuck will that change anything?" Mac says, her voice bursting from her unevenly. "If anything that'll just make it worse." Her hand flutters to her head and oh god, is she going to cry? No. She will not.

"A few reasons," Sloan says carefully but vaguely, concentrating on digging the strings of onion from her sandwich with her pinky finger.

"Like?" Mac demands.

"Like, I think it'll give you some more confidence," Sloan says finally, putting down the sandwich. "You're so close to Nora right now, so focused on each and every detail every day, that it makes you obsessive about failure. And you're new to this and it's scary, because it's raising a freaking kid, and I think work'll be good for you to relax, Kenzie. I think it'll improve your mood so you can relax around Nora. Right now she …"

"She what?"

"I mean, think about it, from her point of view. You're great with the nightmares, with comfort. But you're … anxious, and everyone else is just a little …"

"Warmer? More fun?"

"Honestly? Yeah," Sloan bites her lip. "It's OK to have fun with her. She won't break. And every time she has a breakdown or is disagreeable or confused or … overwhelmed, don't take it personally. She's a kid. She doesn't mean it. And if she does mean it, you're her mom so you can shut it down. Think about what kind of shit you said to your mom as a teenager — that's what's coming." The mention of her mother causes her heart to clench just a bit, closing off as if doused in frigid water.

"What have you decided to do about the job?" she asks after a beat, trying to deflect the attention.

Sloan makes a face. "I need to make a decision soon," she says. "My contract at Bloomberg runs through December 31, but they're pressuring me for a re-up. I need to make a decision by the end of the month. My agent's no help, and I can't talk to Don about it —"

"What's going on with you two?" she interrupts. They've been — not bad, just awkward — for a while now.

She shrugs. "We keep going back and forth. There's no getting around the fact that he'll be my boss, and that it looks like I was hired because I'm married to him, and, hell, I might have been."

"You haven't been, that's bullshit," Mac says, getting a little angry. "And if anyone thinks that — well, fuck them."

Sloan winces, a tic flexing in the right corner of her mouth. "It's not that simple. I don't know — I don't know if I'll ever be able to trust that decisions are being made for me and not because Don loves me. I'm not sure they'll be able to be separated. If something goes wrong, it's my career in jeopardy, not his."

Mac's taken aback. "Surely you trust Don more than that?"

"It's not about trust," Sloan insists.

"Then what the fuck is it about? Because it sounds like you don't trust him to be a professional. You don't trust him to respect you." It seems absolutely surprising, coming from Sloan. She's usually fearlessly balls-out.

"This isn't about trust," Sloan insists. "This is about … jobs, and power, and our relationship. And how he doesn't get why this is a big deal."

"Christ, Sloan, neither do I."

"If this goes south, I will have nothing," Sloan says. "I'll be untouchable. No network will hire me. I screwed over one network for my husband's. That's bad. I'd be a … joke. Late-night talk-show joke. ACN's in … a tough position, again, like all news networks, and there's a lot riding on me if I take it. And the only reason I'm thinking about leaving Bloomberg is because my dad's job means I can't do my job. So if it's just a case of me trading one job where I'm screwed over for my dad for one job where I'm potentially screwed over for my husband, it's not exactly moving up."

"Well, if that's the case, don't take the job."

"You just heard how I'm getting fucked into a corner because of my dad's job, right? I'm being … boxed in by the fucking patriarchy. Damn the men, Kenzie. "

"Well, what can Don do about that?" Mac asks sensibly, and Sloan cracks up, just a little. "You don't honestly believe you'll be an unemployed laughingstock, right? For crying out loud, you're in cable news. We consistently hire far more ridiculous people. Look at Sean Hannity, for fuck's sake."

"Wow, that's definitely what I aspire to," Sloan says, rolling her eyes. "Don would also be my boss. Not in the way that Will was your boss, in the way that Reese is your boss. I'm not wild about the concept. It's not just for a year, or two years. It would be a significant portion of our lives. I just think it would be … wearying. And he doesn't get that, and every time I try and bring it up, he tries to just … make it go away, and it can't, and it won't. And he doesn't get any of this. Every time I try and bring it up, to make him understand, we end up fighting. And it's the same damn fight, over and over again."

Mac stabs a pickle, because Sloan is right there. "I just … First, you're both better than what you're giving yourself credit for here. No, seriously. You're being too harsh, about the possibility of you guys wrecking it in the future. And secondly, you and Don get it right, so much more than you get it wrong. And you do it by being honestly supportive, and … talking, and just … committed. I don't doubt that it would be hard, but if anyone was going to make this all work, it would be you two." Sloan looks honestly taken aback by this. "And honestly, if anyone gives you shit? Fuck them. You know that."

Sloan tips her head, just a little, in a you may be right gesture. "So what did you think of Alicia?"

Mac stiffens, then picks her sandwich back up and chews carefully. "She's young," she muses, her tone neutral. "I forgot how truly young twenty-four can be. She just seemed very young, didn't she?"

"She's a spitfire, that's for sure," Sloan says. "Even though she was wrong."

"Jim's always liked them spunky and willful," she remarks. It's one of many reasons she knows he had a crush on her, ten years ago. "But you're right, she did seem particularly … set. Like she'd never considered there might be other viewpoints out there."

"She was passionate, and it had to have been overwhelming — out to dinner with Will and everything," Sloan says thoughtfully. "I think she held her own. That's not bad."

"Do you know — has Don said if they have had any interaction?" Mac asks.

Sloan shakes her head. "No. I mean, he says they haven't. Or barely. He says she usually sends a producer to talk to him. They both seem to be doing really well at their jobs, though."

"Poor thing. They never got over it, I don't think."

"Mac — you said you wouldn't Emma Woodhouse them."

"I'm not," she protests. "I'm just saying — from experience — that you can't just run away. You really can't. Everything catches up to you, everything comes out, eventually. Maybe they won't reconnect romantically, but they'll need to sort everything out." She raises her eyebrows and shrugs. "You know it's true. You have to face your problems." Sloan gets her implicit connection, and rolls her eyes.

Tuesday, she's incredibly nervous to leave Nora. "She'll be fine, Mac," Will says as he tugs her to the door. Nora, for her part, is already quietly coloring with Nadia.

"That's easy for you to say, you've done this three dozen times already," she says indignantly. But it's easier to slip out instead of making a big production.

At AWM, Will heads to his team on the twenty-second floor — the floor he derisively used to call the geriatrics ward, where all the longform news is — and she heads up, up, up to Don's office. It's a bit disconcerting to see him in a suit. She's seen him in a suit maybe ten times, and eight of those occasions were weddings, funerals, or christenings.

"Mac! How's it feel to be back?"

"A bit odd, actually," she says. "D'you wear a suit every day?"

He rolls his eyes. "Actually, yeah. Got to, Reese says. Max calls me Boring Daddy whenever he sees one."

"Well, it's a snappy look," she finally says. "So, what do I need to know, boss?" She won't technically report to Don — they're both senior vice presidents, and they both report to Charlie — though everyone knows that she will actually, since he is Being Groomed.

Don grins tightly, ill at ease with the nickname. "Charlie'll be stopping by shortly. We've got to talk the ratings mandate and expectations for long-form investigations."

"The ratings mandate?" she asks. She's known for a while that ACN's not in great shape, but Charlie's never been explicit with his words and she's never totally taken Reese seriously. Don, though, is another matter.

Without warning, Charlie pops his head in, his body following, and she involuntarily beams. "Good to have you back, McMac," he says, kissing her cheek. "How's Nora?"

"Great. Handling this better than I am," she grins. "What's this ratings mandate?"

The rest of the discussion is a blur, and she begins to understand Sloan's gripe of ACN 'expecting a lot.' She goes downstairs, meets her staff, most of whom she's met or worked with before. They're already putting together an hourlong program, slated to air in six weeks, on companies in South Africa who, for an exorbitant fee, take wealthy Americans and Russians on safaris that culminate in poaching. It's an engrossing project that makes for a busy day, and she doesn't notice that it's two p.m. until Jim sticks his head in. "How are you liking being back?"

"Jim!" she exclaims. "It's … good, actually." And it is. Time is flying. "Do you want to grab lunch? I suppose you've already eaten, I've completely forgot."

"No, actually, that's why I came down," he grins, and ten minutes later, they're at the cafe across the street, the one with the perpetually rising exorbitant prices. She plonks down thirteen dollars for a sprout-and-eggplant sandwich and hears Neal's voice scolding her. He never likes paying more than eight dollars for a sandwich and constantly scolds them for being lackadaisical with money. She would retort that time, not money, was her precious commodity, though it was less true now.

They pick at their sandwiches and talk about nothing for a while, and finally she says, "So how's Alicia settling in?" at the point where it would be rude not to.

He swallows. "She's … good. She's not really making any sudden moves about her job right now — she's working part-time at a homeless shelter in Brooklyn, and then interning at Save the Children for about 20 hours a week. She says it's just pushing paper." He crumbles a potato chip thoughtfully before saying, "I've gotta ask — that dinner, at Le Bernadin?"

"Yeah?"

"Alicia felt a little …. ganged-up on."

"About what?" Mac asks, a little stunned.

"Well, she thought that you, Sloan, Don and Will were being … intentionally combative."

"How I remember it," Mac says, "is that she said some things about international aid that you, as a reporter, would probably disagree with. Then we asked her to defend herself, which she did poorly, with copious amounts of optimism."

"See, that's how I saw it too, but there's a gracious way to say that, and a harsh way to say that, and you just said what you said pretty harshly."

"You think I'm being harsh on her, Jimmy?" she asks, pipling the detritus of her sandwich on her tray. "If she's going to sit at the grown-up's table, she's going to have to start acting like one."

"Yeah, but it'd help if the other grown-ups at the grown-up table didn't pile on her," he says. "You didn't need to do that. If you're angry at me, fine, but don't take it out on her."

She sighs. "Oh, Jimmy. I'm not angry at you. Not in the least."

"Then what the hell are you?"

"Worried about you, and scared you're going to get hurt again," she says bluntly. She doesn't mean Alicia; she doesn't think that girl has enough of a clue or an awareness to hurt him. She thinks he's going to hurt himself, more than he already has. "I've got to get going back. I've got this slavedriver boss," she jokes.

He carefully piles everything on his tray, but says, "I'm actually going to take a walk, first."

She nods. "Alright then."

Around five-thirty, Will swings by to collect her. She blinks stupidly. "I didn't know it had gotten so late."

"We've got a daughter to get home to, a daughter whose first day of school is tomorrow," he reminds her.

"You know, you've taken to this fatherhood thing more quickly than I expected," she says. "I'm glad, Billy. I didn't think we made the right decision at all, and some days I'm still not sure that I did. … But then I see you with her and I'm glad."

He sucks in a breath. He's still so nervous around Nora, still so concerned he'll turn into his father somehow. He's also, she suspects, worried about keeling over and dying when Nora is dependent on him to be the better parent. "She's hard not to love," he says lightly. "And I'm sorry I haven't been as helpful, but I think now that you're back at work it'll be easier."

"I thought I would feel much guiltier today, but I don't," she muses. "I suppose I could worry that makes me a terrible parent, but I'm too relieved to be back that I don't care."

"It makes you a parent, Mac," he says. "I don't think we'll ever feel like we're doing enough, but we're doing what we can, and the fact that you're working means you're happy, and that will make her happy."

She leans up to kiss him. "I'm very lucky that I married such a wise man."

"And patient, and understanding, and debonair," he says, kissing her again.

"I'll give you the last one, but on the first two? Don't push it, mister," she laughs.

As soon as the elevator doors slide open into their apartment, Nora, undone ribbons clinging to her ponytail, sees them both and dashes for them. "Mommy! Daddy!" she shrieks, and Mac drops to her knees to open her arms.

"Hi, darling one," she says, enveloping her tightly. "I missed you." And she says it with such sincere joy that she begins to see Sloan's point.

It's still not easy when she's back at work — on the first day of school, Nora cried so hard that Will went and sat with her all day, and she spends at least an hour a day worrying about Nora — but it's easier. She enjoys her time with her daughter much more, and Nora seems to find her more interesting. When Nora starts throwing a tantrum for a cookie at lunch, she says no, means it, and Nora miraculously stops crying. She and Will finally start carrying Nora back to her own yellow room once she's fallen asleep, and then eventually they just read her books and have her sleep there full-time. This means they can finally have sex again, and it restores a balance to her life. She's clearer-headed. More relaxed. Capable of nuanced, non-desperate thoughts. When Nora brings her back artwork from school, she brings it into her office to decorate, and things feel blessedly normal.

Three weeks later, it's Sloan's surprise birthday party for Don's fortieth. Will and Nora are part of the ruse — they're taking Don and Max to a baseball game at Yankee Stadium, and Sloan's parents are in town and watching the girls upstairs during prep — and she has to help Sloan set up. "Have you made a decision about the job?" she asks as they greet guests and arrange presents. There are easily sixty guests, and they're luckily mingling all together, giving her and Sloan an extra blessed few seconds to get everything set. Sloan's in a tizzy.

Sloan pauses. "Not yet. But almost," she promises. "Do you think there's enough booze out? And you think he'll like this, right?"

"Yes, and of course he will," she says reasonably. "He'll love all the thought you put into it."

"And Will hasn't texted back yet?"

She checks her phone. "He's about ten out, actually." The doorbell rings. "I'll go get that."

It's Jim and Alicia, and she smiles widely though artificially. She hasn't spoken to Jim since they're lunch, really. "Jim. Alicia. Welcome! Come in, come in, how are you?" she tries to sound busy and warm and welcoming, for Jim's sake.

"Great," Alicia chirps, holding up a wrapped box. "I love New York in the fall."

"Makes me want to send someone a bouquet of pencils," Mac quotes.

"Oh my god, that'd be adorable," Alicia says, the reference completely skating over her head.

She tries not to roll her eyes. "Well, come in, presents go that way, by Sloan, on that table."

"What a lovely home," Alicia smiles, handing Sloan the gift.

"Did you guys redecorate?" Jim asks. "It looks much bigger."

"Yeah. When our family grew by sixty-six percent, we added a floor" she smiles. "I need to go turn off the lights for when they get here, but I'll give you a tour later."

Don and Will and the kids come back, and Don is surprised speechless. He kisses Sloan deeply in front of all their guests, and it makes Mac turn to Maggie and sigh. "We pulled off this surprise pretty well," she says, with a wry smirk. She's terrible at surprises.

Maggie responds with a joking eyeroll. "Yes, we're all very proud of you."

"Damn straight," she says, half-laughing, when she gets a tap on her shoulder. She turns to see Jim.

Maggie turns serious in a second. "I need to be going," she says vaguely. She's brought a date — a friend of Tess's husband — which makes Mac proud and sad. "I need to find Brent. Hey, Jim. Good to see you."

"Hey, Maggie," he responds, awkwardly drawing out the words. "Hey, Mac. Can we chat?" Maggie slips away.

"Um, sure," Mac says. Sensing he wants a little privacy, she slips into the media room, with its glossy, expansive views of the city. "Where's Alicia?"

"On that tour Sloan promised," he says. "Listen, I just want to talk about the … lunch we had. And I want to talk. And for you to listen. Just … listen."

He looks nervous, and earnestly serious, and so much younger than he is. She nods. "Alright. Go."

"I know that you don't particularly like Alicia —"

"I don't dislike —"

"I talk, you listen, right? You promised."

"Sorry."

"Thank you. I know you don't particularly like her, and I get that. It's fine. I know you want me to … patch things up with Maggie. I know you think we need to do that, to be friends, at least. You don't need to say it; it's in each and every one of your interactions with any of us. But Mac, I need you to stop. I need you to get over it, to accept Alicia. I know that you think she's young, and I know we're not a perfect couple, but nobody is, Mac. Not you and Will, not Don and Sloan. But we're in this, we're married, and Christ, Mac, I've fucked up enough, in the last eight years … Basically since we've come back from Afghanistan. I've fucked up every relationship I've had. Maggie … I know you think you understand what we went through, with the baby, but you don't. You can't. Neither of us will get past that, not now, not ever. I wish, every day, that it had turned out differently. That we'd stayed at your place, or that that man had seen that stop sign. Every. Single. Day. I will die wishing that had gone differently. But it happened, it's done, and now … I've fucked up every good thing in my life in the last eight years, and I can't fuck up one more. But I can't make this work unless you're supportive, Mac, I can't. You're my sister. You are. In a way that neither of my actual big sisters are. And so I just … I need you."

Her throat is dry, and Jim is near tears. "Alright. Of course. Jim … I'm so —"

"Don't say sorry," he says, roughly. "You've said it so much. Everyone says it so much. I can't respond any more, I can't think any more. So don't say it."

She's numb. "Right. Of course. I won't, Jim."

The door swings open, and they both turn. "Hey," Jim says brightly, as Sloan and Alicia come in, presumably on their tour. Alicia has Emma on her hip, and Sloan's helping Anna toddle in too.

"Jim, this home is amazing," Alicia says, her eyes wide and happy as she comes up to him. She kisses him briefly before pulling away. "Have you seen the Where the Wild Things Are mural in Max's room? It's a work of art. And the views!" She lets Emerson down and turns to Sloan. "Thank you so much for having us over. This is wonderful. And such a thoughtful birthday gift."

"Thanks," Sloan says. Don enters then, sliding in behind her and looping his arm around her shoulder. Mac knows that they'll be fine. "Hey, mister," she smiles. "Happy birthday."

"This is fantastic. Thank you," he murmurs, kissing her ear. "Everyone enjoying themselves in here?"

"Yup," Jim says, holding up his drink. "Happy birthday, Don." The girls run up to the window, and Alicia starts wandering to look at the bookshelves, which Mac has to admit are lined with a pretty impressive collection. "How's 40 treating you?"

"You know, I'd always thought it would start some sort of crazy midlife spiral, but it's great," he smiles. "Way better than turning twenty or thirty felt, actually. But I've got a lot that I'm honestly pretty grateful for, I think that helps," he smiles.

"Sloan, when was this picture taken?" Alicia asks, in a funny voice, holding up a silver frame. Sloan goes over to inspect, and Mac turns to watch, half-listening to the guys' conversation.

"Oh that? That was, um, Max's christening," Sloan replies.

"And that's Maggie? Jim's ex?" Alicia asks, and Mac puts it together before Sloan does. Oh, Jim. Such a pretty, optimistic idiotic man. Fuck. This will not end well. She sits down on the arm of the sofa and tries to discreetly gesture to Don.

"Yeah. She's … she's here actually," Sloan says, slightly tense, unclear where this is going.

"Yeah, I thought I saw her," Alicia says, her brow furrowed and her tone confused. "Jim, come here, please, babe?"

"What's up?" he says and Mac sucks in a breath.

Alicia looks up at him, hurt on her face. "Jim, was Maggie pregnant?"


	11. Chapter Ten -- Sloan

Sloan

You have to pick the places you don’t walk away from — Joan Didion

When Sloan was maybe fifteen, her father had given her a piece of advice she’d never forgotten: They were all at the dinner table, eating, but mostly listening to Spencer prattle on about some seventh-grade mean girls and beg for tips on how to make them like her. Their father, calmly chewing his peas, finally said, “If you can’t beat ‘em, fuck ‘em.” 

Sloan had been shocked, mostly because she’d never heard her dad say more than hell or sometimes a hissed goddamn in the past, and always on the phone. He was kind and gentle (well, as kind and gentle as a Goldman vice president in Asia in the 90s could be) and she’d never seen him lose his temper or raise his voice. He got stern, sure, but this was entirely something new.

Spencer’s jaw dropped immediately, while her mom hissed Thomas and Sawyer, who was maybe seven, said, “What’s fuck?” Sloan herself had started laughing. 

What I mean,” her father had then explained, “is that if you’ve thought about it and you’ve tried and you can’t figure out a way to win — and I’m not talking that it’s a competition, Spencer, when I say ‘win’ I mean to achieve your objective — then who cares about their rules? Stop. Stop caring. You can write a new playbook.Redefine the terms. Make them your own. You need to take control of a situation, and that means adjusting something. Now that something might be internal, like your attitude, but it might not be. But it’s no use sitting here, complaining. If you can’t beat them …” he looked warily at his wife and caught himself, “screw them.” And Sloan was the only daughter old enough to understand, but he clearly meant screw in two different ways. She suddenly saw her father in a slightly more ruthless light. 

But it was liberating advice. Redefine the terms. To be fair, Sloan was naturally gifted enough and pretty enough — even then, even at her most awkward, she was pretty enough — that she could usually triumph playing by the rules. She got the grades, made the friends, cracked the jokes, won the prizes, easily enough. Too easily, even. But redefine the terms. She loved that. It allowed her to be ambitious in ways that girls weren’t; adventurous and assertive in situations where she typically would not have been either. It got her through high school, college, internships, fellowships, her Ph.D., her years at Goldman, her jump to ACN, her marriage to Don. She had always redefined the terms, made the decisions that she wanted to. High school wasn’t what she expected? She enrolled at Berkeley at sixteen. The professor she was dating went back to his wife? She got into a better Ph.D. program than he went to. IMF passed her over for an internship? She went to Treasury, rocked it, and was offered a job by the IMF two years later — and turned it down. Asshole fiance cheated on her? She left Goldman and him and found a better job and a better partner. The idea of moving in with another man terrified her? She would wait until they’d married to move in with Don— but got married four days after getting engaged and ten months after the first date. She moved through things, she aspired, she reinvented, she persevered. She rewrote what success meant to her. She never lost. She redefined the terms.

But now it was difficult to frame the terms of the debate advantageously. One of the things she’s always loved most about her relationship with Don is that, while both of them are plenty insecure, they never doubt the other’s abilities and potential. When she loses faith in herself, she knows that Don has faith in her, and that — that matters. She’s never doubted Don; never doubted his integrity, his honesty, his strength, his potential, or his commitment to her. 

But now, she doubts him. She doubts his ability to make this better-- and fixing things, handling things, is where Don’s bread is buttered. It’s all he wants. And she doesn’t know how to act, either. She’s an all-star, she’s dazzled on her own merits since preschool. She’s absolutely unused to the notion that her professional life was entwined with her father’s and husband’s, and it offends both her patrilineal Old New England work ethic and the meritocratic grit her first-generation-American mother had instilled in her. 

Kenzie thinks her reluctance to take the job is about trust, but it isn’t. At its core it’s about practicality. She’s already put herself in a tight spot by stepping back from primetime for the kids (she’d sidestepped a demotion by going to Bloomberg, another example of her framing the terms of the debate advantageously), and there’s no prenup for a work marriage between her and Don. If this fails, she’s left with nothing; he’ll still be the crown prince of a network and she’s in journalistic Siberia. Plus, there’s the day-to-day of working together, the endless negotiations of who is in charge when and why and what’s going on. It will be a lot of talking and — probably — a lot of equivocating. On both their ends. It will grind on them, she knows, wear down the solid foundation of their relationship. Besides the opportunity to return to financial journalism, Bloomberg had offered room for her marriage to grow. 

So they linger for far too long in the tension between worry and resolution. They make it through a long Labor Day weekend at Mac and Will’s beach house; they make it through the first day of school; they make it through two business trips and eighteen-hour days and scraped knees and Emerson coming down with a cold and Max smacking his head falling on the playground. This makes sense though, because no matter what they are a good team. In secret, she begins to plan a blowout for his 40th birthday. Nothing crazy, nothing like Will’s ‘retirement’ party, which she can honestly say is the most absurd bash ACN has ever thrown (though it was a pretty bitchin’ time — she ended up doing shots with Mia Farrow after dancing till her feet hurt with Allison Williams). She wants something more low-key, something thoughtful and personal and at their home. But she wants him to know that she loves him; besides, no matter how uncomfortable and awful things are with them right now, she thinks he deserves it. 

She calls Reese up directly and says she needs more time to make her decision — at any rate, the earlier it’s feasible for her to break her contract is January. The pecuniary penalty is far less bad if it’s after the New Year. He sighs, and says, “Just for you.” She wants to ask if it’s because of her or Don, but she bites it back in case she sounds paranoid.

She doesn’t want to talk to him, but this tension isn’t doing either of them any favors. So one night after they’ve handled bedtime, she sighs and says, “We need to talk,” as they do the last of the dishes. She hates bringing up awkward things before she’s worked out what she wants to do— even now, years and children later, she flushes just thinking about the awkwardness with Don after she let him know she was interested — but she hates feeling off-kilter more. Besides, isn’t that the point of marriage? To talk to them about whatever you want? 

He nods, his eyes relieved. “Yeah,” he says. “OK. Do you want any wine?”

“I have Scotch, actually,” she says, lifting the glass from where she’d discarded it behind the basket of fruit. “I … poured it earlier,” she explains weakly.

He shrugs. “Is that Charlie’s?” He swings the bottle down from the shelf, scoops up a tumbler of his own. “Wanna go on the terrace?”

She’s about to say no — the kids — but ends up nodding. Clem pads out behind them, settles on the cement in a far corner as they side side-by-side on a loveseat. The city is still August-hot, and she immediately feels faintly as if she’s being smothered by wet towels. But there’s some breeze (or radiating smog), and the lights and sounds of the city are comforting in the flickering dusk. She listens to the heaves and honks and trills of ambulances as she sips her Scotch, the ice cubes clinking together noisily. 

“Alright,” she says. “So let’s talk.”

He laughs, almost ironically. “Oh no, Sloan. You first.” 

She pauses, her lips pursed. “I think I might be mad at my dad,” she confesses, the words practically tripping out of her in a burst that surprises her. Then she sighs, because that makes sense. “And since I can’t be mad at my dad, I’m being mad at you instead,” she admits.   
He’s clearly surprised — that’s not where he saw the conversation going. “Sloan, you can be mad at your dad. I’ve seen you two argue for three hours —in Japanese — about African economic policy.”

“That’s it — we can argue about economics,” she stresses. “We can have intellectual debates. But I never — I’ve never been mad at him, not about something real. He’s my dad.” Sloan’s self-aware enough to know that her admiration of strong men starts with daddy-hero worship.  
He’s quiet, and she realizes why. “Dads can disappoint you. They do it a lot, actually. You’re lucky that you’ve gotten this far.” She reaches over and wordlessly squeezes his hand before lacing their fingers together.

“I know. I’m lucky. Just like our kids will be.” He pulls their linked hands together and kisses the back of her hand. Her eyes darken. “But I don’t know how to talk to him. I don’t. To tell him that I’m angry that his job is fucking me over.” 

“Well, I think you have to call him up. Or maybe go down to Washington. But if it’s bothering you, you either have to tell him, or have to get over it and let it go. C’mon, Sloan. That’s the peewee leagues of social interaction.” His words are encouraging, not condescending. He clearly thinks there’s more to it. 

“I know,” she sits back, then changes her mind and curls over, putting her head on his lap. His hand drifts to her hip. “Thank you,” she says.  
“You’re welcome,” he replies, and waits for her to continue. When she doesn’t, he says, “Wait. Is that it? That can’t be it.”  
“What else do you want me to say?”   
“I dunno. I mean … Are you going to talk to him? And I’m confused, Sloan. You’re mad at your dad, which I get, I do, but I’m not sure how that impacts the job offer. Or us.”  
“I don’t like having my hand forced,” she explains, sitting up. She’s always been independent; he gets her. “That’s upsetting me, that it’s coming at a time when I’m mad at him. I don’t want to make this decision because I’m mad at my dad.”  
“Then don’t. Let’s talk about the salary. Or your vision for covering news. Or if you want the option of teaching again, and how you could make that happen. I’m trying to help you make the decision, Sloan, but you’re making it tough.”   
“My options are to be in a position where I’m compromised because of my dad’s job, or get one where I’m compromised by my husband’s. And that’s just objection number one to ACN right now.”  
“Take me out of the equation,” he says. “Just … look at the job. What do you get?”  
“I can’t take you out of the equation,” she says, then switches tactics. “Walk me through a day.”  
“A day?”  
“Yes. A day. Where there are business and ethical decisions that need to be made. Where news has to be covered. I’m not talking preferential treatment — I’m talking the type of everyday disagreements that will happen in a world where you’re head of news, and I’m an anchor — high-ranking, sure, but there’s Elliot and Aaron and Will and Terri. Plenty of us. I want to know what that day, where I am an anchor and you are my boss, would go.” She raises her eyebrows expectantly.  
“Sloan, I don’t think I ever showed you favoritism or cut you slack as an anchor when we were working together. You’re good. I know that. I know you. I trust you.”  
“OK, but we disagreed, and we got into arguments. Not all the time, but sometimes. And you were not my boss, and now you would be my boss. Tell me. How. A day. Would go.”   
He gawps like a fish for a second. “I dunno, you would probably want to go in a little earlier than me, I would guess, I would come in later … I’d work on my floor, you’d work on your floor …”   
“There’s a big news story. A … ferry sinks off the coast of New Jersey, and I think we’re covering it too much. You might, too, but it’s bringing our biggest ratings of the last six months. But I say I’m not going to cover it any more. What do you do?”  
He shrugs as he struggles to come up with an answer. “You would seriously do that?”  
“Yes! I have before.” He knows that. She tries again. “Or, I go soft on the Treasury Secretary since I know he can’t do jack the Congressional deadlock, and you think I should’ve gone harder. Or I think the new social-media initiative is stupid and have an AP tweet for me. Or I think I should lead with a story about the stock market but everyone else leads with a presidential candidate saying something legitimately stupid about Israel/Palestine, and we have the low ratings that day, or I say the n word on camera quoting an asshole Tea Partier. Or we’re arguing about which kindergarten to send Max to, and just can’t have a conversation about ratings that day,” she takes a deep breath. “You think this is still about trust and while I was a little skeptical, I’m not now. I believe it’s not favoritism, and I’m sorry for doubting you. I’m just concerned about the practical stuff. I know you’ll have my back on the big stuff and I know we’ll generally genuinely agree, but it’s just … it would be hard, the little stuff, day in, day out, for five or ten years. It wouldn’t be the big stuff. The big fights are never about the big things; they’re about a million little things. We would never have space. When you were an EP and I was a correspondent, whenever we worked together we argued. And that was fine! That was good! I like that we think different things and aren’t afraid to disagree. But given how much of a micromanager you are and how much of a high-maintenance perfectionist I am, day in, day out, I can’t see that being healthy for us. I think it will grate. And then, yes, you layer on the fact that I’m contemplating a switch because my dad’s career fucked me over, then yes, I am hesitant. If this doesn’t work out, Don, I’m finished in news, whether or not I want to be. I need a game plan. I need …,” she pauses, because she’s unexpectedly teary, “I need you to be cynical. At the very least, a realist. You’re not a cynic, but you are a realist, and you’re not being one right now. I need you to be one.”   
He’s quiet, and she realizes that she’s finally gotten through to him. “It would be hard,” he agrees. “I don’t know how we would navigate those situations, honestly. I don’t. Day in, day out, I don’t know. I don’t, and I’m sorry if that’s not enough of an answer.”   
Sloan feels like yanking her hair out, slowly, strand by strand until her skull is puffier than a Pomeranian. “You’re the planner, and this, of all things, needs a plan.”   
“Ok, yes, I like details, but for god’s sake, Sloan, I’m a producer, not a planner, which means that after something gets started, I figure out how to navigate out of a situation. Yeah, I don’t know how we’ll get out of each of those situations; yeah, it’ll be tough balancing the personal and professional; yeah, these are not normal problems. But I think this is a good job opportunity for you and I don’t want you to talk yourself out of it. And you know what? I think we’re pretty good, generally. Yes, we’ll argue. Some days more than others, even. But I’ve always loved working with you. Hell, I loved working with you before I loved you, and I love it even when I hate it. And even though we weren’t working with each other, we were in pretty close proximity for four years. It’s not insignificant. I think we can make this work. And, I promise not to give you any preferential treatment. Zero. Hell, I’ll send you on a long-term assignment to Malaysia if that will help. If you want to do this, I think we can make this work. But, Christ, you have to want to, and right now I’m not sure you do.”  
Staring at him, all wide-eyed and crazy-haired and baldly earnest and so essentially Don, the exacting, pessimistic, hopeful-beyond-reason man she married, she wants to believe him, to say yes, to think about the job on its merits. She’s struck. “Please don’t ever send me to Malaysia,” she finally says. Then she leans back against the armrest of the loveseat. “You’re asking a lot,” she points out.   
“I know. I’m sorry. So are you.”   
“I know. But it’s a big thing,” she says. There’s a beat. “I need to talk to my father,” she admits.   
“I think you do too,” he agrees, tugging her back so her head rests on his chest.   
The next Saturday, she gets up way too early and grabs the Acela to D.C. She intends to work on the way but ends up just dozing: When does a mother of three ever get time alone? By 11, she’s in a cab to her parents’ home on the border of Georgetown and the Palisades. Sloan hasn't told her parents that she's coming, and she's extremely surprised when her sister, Spencer, answers the door.   
"Sloan! Oh, my god." Spencer moves in for a hug. "Mom and Dad didn't say you were coming."  
"I didn't call them, actually," she admits.   
"Is everything ok? The kids? Is Don dying? Are you dying?" Spencer, a high-school teacher and principal turned the chief of staff for the D.C. school district, is bubbly, excitable — and easily distracted outside work. She watches too much local news, and her mind immediately jumps to the worst places.   
"No. No no no. I just wanted to come see them and decided it on short notice so I decided to make it a surprise. That's all, that’s it. Are you … pregnant again?” she asks, astonished. Spencer is typically willowy, like her, but is noticeably thicker around the middle. And it wouldn’t be surprising. Spence and Brent always wanted a big family.  
Spencer smiles, proud of herself. “I am. Fourteen weeks.”  
“Fourteen? I didn’t know.”  
“Yeah … We didn’t tell Mom and Dad until last week. It’s … complicated.”  
“Complicated?”  
“Yeah. I’m older now —”  
“You’re thirty-six. I had the twins when I was thirty-six. Is everything OK?” Spencer is maddeningly vague.   
“Yeah. It’s fine. I just didn’t want to tell anyone right away, since I’m no longer thirty — or even close to it — and then I didn’t want you all finding out through Mom, but it’s been busy at work, so I haven’t had a chance to call. Anyways. Are you pregnant? Is that why you came down? I didn't think you wanted more kids, but I noticed when I caught your show last week that your dress —"   
"Don't you dare even finish that thought. No I am not pregnant. Where are Mom and Dad, Spence?" she smooths her shirt over her still pretty flat stomach, just to reassure herself.   
"Relax. I was just going to say that I noticed you were wearing a shift and you only wear shifts when you’re pregnant, or so it feels like. I thought it’d be nice, being pregnant at the same time. And Mom went in to Foggy Bottom. Dad is at the park with the kids, but they should be headed back soon. Are you sure everything is ok? I feel whenever you're in DC, I only find out from watching you interview the president the next day. Or from your Twitter feed. Or Mom."   
Sloan feels a twinge of guilt. While she is exceptionally close to her parents, they cultivated four only children. She's not particularly close with any of her sisters, and Spencer’s not close to the twins (who are their own, twinned-up entity) either. Sloan emails all of them rarely, calls even more infrequently. It’s gotten worse as she and Spencer had families and the younger two moved halfway across the globe to chase fabulous careers. She’s pretty sure, actually, that Spencer and her family could move continents and she wouldn’t know unless a parent pointed it out. She definitely was the last to know when Sawyer took a job in London. It makes some sense: They are all fully their own women, pursuing their goals with abandon and ambition, exactly like their parents wanted them too. She was never bothered by it, but now it gives her pause. It’s certainly not something she would wish for her own children.   
“No. I needed to talk to Dad about a job offer and …” she trails off.  
“That’s awesome. Still in TV? Or in economics this time?”  
“Yeah. Back at ACN, actually.” she kicks the ball of her left foot into the tiled floor. It doesn’t scuff. Huh. Good floors.   
“How’s Don liking being back? He’s been there a couple months now right?”  
“Since May, yeah, Spence. Listen, it’s stupid. And kinda complicated.”  
“You know, I have the exact same number of college degrees that you do. You can explain it.” Spencer’s mouth quirks up, and Sloan suppresses the urge to point out that a Master’s and a Ph.D. in education do not add up to two Ph.D.s in economics.  
“No, it’s not that. It’s just …”  
“Complicated?” Spencer asks archly.  
“Well … Yeah. It is, in fact, complicated.”   
Spencer rolls her eyes and smiles. “Well, you won’t get to talk about it for a while, then. You want something to eat? And how are the kids?”  
Their combined seven and a half children are enough to keep conversation flowing for the next half hour, when their father returns with Sloan’s nieces and nephew.   
“Aunt Sloan!” Hanna, the oldest, careening to a stop when she sees her. She’s lanky for nine, with the lighter coloring of her All-American father, Brent. Her mouth hangs open.   
“How did you get in here?” Harper, the next oldest at almost-seven, says. She looks absolutely confused by the situation. Sloan’s temporarily worried about her chances at getting into a good college, before she remembers that Brent’s an adjunct at Georgetown, which has to count for something. “Grandpa, Aunt Sloan’s here!”   
“Hey guys,” she smiles, wishing she didn’t have to deal with Spencer’s brood today. Having her own children didn’t make her good with children; it made her a mother. “I came as a surprise, for your grandfather. But I was surprised that I got to see you too! I’m very excited.”   
“Sloan?” her father says, shocked, as he enters with Brendan, who is four like Max, and two-year-old Haddie. “My darling.” His giant hands cup her face and he kisses her forehead. “To what do we owe this pleasant surprise?”   
“I just … wanted to come down. And see you,” she smiles.   
“And you didn’t bring my lovely grandchildren? Did I not raise you right?”  
“Well, it looks like you still got some granddad action today.”  
“Yeah, Grandpa, you still got to see us,” Hanna pouts.  
“You, Hanna Grace, are the only reason that I am not throwing myself to the ground, kicking and screaming and crying, after finding out how grievously your Aunt Sloan has disappointed me,” he says, totally deadpan but with a twinkle in his eye.   
“You’re silly, Grandpa,” Brendan laughs.   
Spencer grins, then stands with two crisp claps. “Alright, Popovec children. We have some soccer practice to get to. Say bye to Grandpa and Aunt Sloan and let’s get going.”   
“Wait, where are Max and Emmy and Annie? Why can’t we see them? We haven’t seen them in like fifty years,” Harper groans.  
“Not fifty, dummy, you’re not even fifty. If you hadn’t seen them in fifty years how would you know them?” Hanna points out. Sloan smirks.  
“Harper, don’t whine. Hanna, don’t call your sister names. They’re in New York with Uncle Don. We’ll make a trip up to visit later this fall, OK? Brendan, where is your coat?”   
“Um, in the park?”  
“Or the hallway, buddy,” Sloan’s father says.  
“Or there,” Brendan admits sheepishly.   
Spencer and her crew leave in the same whirlwind they came in with, and there’s a void of noise with their automatic absence.   
After a beat to savor the calm, her father’s brow furrows. “Is everything alright, Sloan?”  
“I – yes,” she says. “Yes. Everyone’s alright. Nobody’s — nobody’s dying. Or even sick; the kids and Don are great, actually. And Don and I are great. I mean, it’s hard, marriage is, sometimes, but overall we’re good. We’re solid.”  
“That’s not what I asked.”   
“I — no, but that’s important. Someone shows up unexpectedly on your doorstep, you gotta wonder if everyone’s ok.”   
He studies her, then double-taps his wedding ring against the tiled island. “I wasn’t worried. If something were truly wrong you wouldn’t come down here first. You would call. We would go up.”  
He’s right. “Good point,” she concedes.   
“Caught yesterday’s show. Good analysis of the changes to the antitrust laws.”  
“Thanks,” she says.  
“Ok. Wanna go get ice cream?”  
“Ice cream?”  
“Your mother is going to be at work for a while. I’m assuming that, even if nobody is dying and you’re not getting a divorced, something dragged my successful, busy, mother-of-three-small-children daughter down on a train on a Saturday, and I don’t have a good feeling about that something. It feels like something that you tell me and your mother at once. So I’m not worried, Sloan, but I’m sure as hell concerned.”  
She looks down at the table, feeling fifteen again. “I got a job offer.”   
“What?” his brow furrows. “That’s great.”   
“Yes and no,” she says. “It’s at ACN. I’d be reporting to Don, essentially.”  
“You two have worked together before.”  
“We worked at the same office before. I didn’t report to him. And … you can’t tell anyone, Dad, but there’s a good chance he’ll be promoted to president of ACN. Not president of ACN News. The whole damn network. In the next few years.”   
“OK….” he says. “It is … a lot more money?”  
“It’s a raise, but it’s not life-changing,” she says. “And at this point, the salary doesn’t matter. Money’s nice, but whatever.”  
“So don’t take the job, if you don’t want it.”  
“Yeah, there’s a problem with that. I’m being … I’m being increasingly marginalized at Bloomberg. They’re concerned that your job presents a conflict of interest.”   
“I’m sorry?”   
“They’re concerned that the fact that their lead anchor’s dad is on the Fed is a conflict of interest. Can’t say I don’t see their point.”  
“So you don’t want to stay there?”  
“I got into journalism to help people better understand the economy. I can’t do that now. It’s not really up for debate.”   
“And I’m guessing by your tone you don’t want to take the ACN job?”   
“Because the thing I absolutely want to do after getting aced out of my job due to my father’s job is to report to my husband for the next twenty years of my career.”   
“Then go to another network.”  
“They have the same objections as Bloomberg.” She’s done some scooping.  
“Ok … Then if you’re unhappy, go teach economics at Columbia again. Or write a book. Or stay at home with your kids. You just said; money is ‘whatever.’”   
“What I want to do is be an anchor.”  
“Then be an anchor, Sloan. You have an opportunity and you need to make the best of it. Did you come down to … pout? Sloan. Grow up. You’re better than this.”   
“Hey. That’s not exactly fair. Right now, your job is actively interfering with my ability to be a journalist.”   
“Sloan. I didn’t know that, and I’m sorry about that. I love you.”  
“I am your favorite daughter.”  
“I don’t have favorites,” he gives her a pointed look, which she doesn’t blame him for (though she totally knows she’s the favorite).  
“I love you but …” she prompts him, since she knows where that’s going.  
“There’s not but. I love you. All of you, the same way Don does. Not the same way Don does, but you get the point. But —”  
“A ha!”   
“Fine, yes. There’s a but. You are one of the most ambitious, accomplished people you know. I’m so proud that I get to say I raised you, because that makes it seem like it might be something I did, instead of something you were innately born with. But you don’t like when things get hard, and you’ve been smart enough to always have other options.”  
“What are you talking about?”  
“When you didn’t like high school, you left for college two years early, despite your mother’s and my objections. When you got into that relationship with that married professor — don’t think we didn’t know about it — you went to Duke instead of Stanford, even though Stanford had a much better program, because you didn’t want to be near him. When Topher cheated on you, you left Goldman. I’m not saying that those weren’t good decisions, that made sense to you, and I’m not saying that they didn’t work out for the best and you didn’t learn from them, and you didn’t become stronger. But you don’t like when things are hard. This might be hard, but it sounds like you’re unhappy where you are and it’s a good option. It’s not perfect but it’s good. So take it.”  
She gasps. “I was redefining the terms!”  
“What?”  
“I was redefining the terms. Making my own choices, moving on. If you can’t beat them, fuck them.”  
“I actually have no idea what you are talking about.”  
“It was your advice. When I was … I don’t know, fifteen!”  
“OK, I don’t remember this at all. I was raising four daughters; half the time I was making up shit to keep your sisters calm.”  
“What? Dad! We took you seriously!”  
“I think it sounds like generally good advice, but it’s also important to distinguish between when you’re redefining the terms and when you’re running because things are hard. And when you redefine the terms, that means you adjust your attitude. You don’t do it … with some sort of chip on your shoulder, or because it’s a less risky choice. You do it because you want to do it.”  
She’s quiet. “Why did the take the job?”  
He laughs. “Have you ever been asked by the president for anything?”  
“President Obama asked me for gum once.”  
“When the President asks, you don’t say no. You say ‘I serve at the pleasure of the President.’”  
“Ok, Jed Bartlet,” she says, then takes a deep breath. “I don’t like the lack of agency here. I don’t like having my hand forced, and I am genuinely worried about working together so closely.”  
“Sloan. You have a private-school education, two Ph.D.s, an apartment in Manhattan, and are talking about a salary that’s over a million dollars. You have plenty of agency, not to mention privilege. You’re not a heroine in a Kate Chopin novel.”   
“And you’re not some noble Henry Fonda character. You’ve never been interested in domestic policy or the Fed. Why’d you take it?”  
“Sloan —”  
“It’s fucking with my life and my career. So I think I deserve to know.”   
He shrugs one shoulder. “A couple reasons. I was at the end of my contract and I like a new challenge. The president did ask, it’s not something you turn down easily. But a lot of it was your mother had a great opportunity, and if she took it and I stayed in Palo Alto we wouldn’t see each other much, and when you realize you don’t have that many years left, you decide you want to spend them with the people that you love. I had to make a choice, and I gave up a great job to privilege my relationship with your mother. She followed me to Japan and made the best of that when you guys were kids; now I followed her to D.C. I’m not saying that it wouldn’t be hard to have Don be your boss. But if you think it’s going to give you a better deal than Bloomberg, then why the hell not give it a shot? You’re one of the hardest workers I know; I think you can make it work.”   
“If it fails, I’m out of news.”  
“First off, I have plenty of faith that if you wanted a different job, you could get it. But if it fails, you know that you tried and you gave it your all. I know I’m the one that taught you risk forecasting, Sloan, but just because there are risks you’re aware of doesn’t mean it’s not your best option, or that you shouldn’t take that chance. And it doesn’t mean you wouldn’t be great at ACN or Bloomberg or writing a column for the New York Times or whatever you decide to do.”  
“What if —”  
“Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” he says, then brightens. “Oooh. That’s good advice. I’d remember that one.”   
“I wish you had at least told me ahead of time this is something you were thinking about.”  
“I am sorry for that. I didn’t think through how this would affect your job, though in retrospect that seems obvious.”   
There’s really not much more to say about that, and her anger toward him dissipates, releasing like helium seeping from a leftover birthday-party balloon. She’s built an entire situation in her head, but it’s gone, every argument planned and had and discarded and modified. Now the only thing left to do is move forward. She nods when her dad asks her if she’d like him to call her mom, and the three of them grab ice cream and walk through McLean Gardens before she hops a cab to Union Station. She spends the train back handling details of Don’s birthday party next week, and is back home by five.   
Don texts that he and the kids are at Hippo Playground, and she joins them there. “Mom!” Max yells, jumping off a hippo and hugging her, getting her completely wet in the process. “We missed you all day.”  
“I know, I’m sorry,” she smiles. “But I’m back now! Can I still play with you?”  
“Of course.”  
“Swings, Mama,” Susannah insists, and they head toward the tire swings. Don, holding Emerson’s hand, is right behind her.  
“Good talk?” he asks.  
“Great talk,” she smiles.   
“So how was your dad?” he asks, much later, when all the kids are in bed and they’re splitting a half bottle of pinot grigio.   
She hesitates. “Good,” she says, measuredly. “We should have them both up more often.” Don hums in agreement as he sips his wine. “Do you think I run from challenges?”  
“What? Hell no. What did your dad say?”  
“Not, like, work challenges. But … personal challenges. He said that when I got scared, I tended to run, and then rationalize it. I … He had a couple of good examples.”   
“Like what?”  
“Quitting Goldman. Going to Duke instead of Stanford. Going to college early because I hated high school. He thinks I don’t face personal problems head-on. He’s not wrong.”  
Don contemplates. “I don’t think … I wasn’t there for any of the decisions, so I can’t really make a call. But when you have options, you usually do the one that seems most insane, except according to your internal projections. Does that calculator involve a bit of self-preservation? Probably. Mine does too. Everyone’s does — nobody likes getting the shit kicked out of them; nobody really likes risk and uncertainty. And it’s not like any of those situations were easy. Most of them sucked majorly. If he said that I think he was underestimating how hard starting over can be, too.”  
“There was one time I didn’t,” she says, musing, then smiles.  
“What are you talking about?”  
“After I told you I was single because you’d never asked me out. I should’ve quit then.”  
He smiles before kissing her. “I for one am very glad you didn’t,” he takes another sip. “So what are you going to do?”  
“I think I’m going to take the ACN offer.” A happy smile starts to flood his face, and she says, “To be clear I’m going to give it a few more days.”

“OK. Is that the staying option or the fleeing option?”

“It’s the staying. It’s the harder, riskier choice.”

“It’s your decision. I’m proud of you, you know that?”

And she does. 

She spends the rest of the week thinking about her decision, and planning Don’s stealth party. She’s got caterers and an eighty-person guest list, and she’s proud of how seemingly none of them have let anything slip to her husband. On Saturday she sends them out and lets in many, many guests — way more than she anticipated actually showing up. She’s a bit nervous, but when Don — who fears surprises — walks in and is genuinely shocked and grateful, she’s so proud and happy. 

Those feelings are dashed, of course, when she inadvertently informs Alicia Harper about why her husband and Maggie had split. After Alicia, her voice all strangly and betrayed, asks Jim if Maggie was ever pregnant, he exhales slowly and says, “Yes. She was.”

“With your child?”

“...Correct.”

“Where the hell is the child now? Do you have a … three year old running around somewhere? Is it with Maggie? Is it here?” Sloan busies herself straightening Emerson’s dress, catches Will’s eyes as they drift up toward the ceiling in a holyfuckingGod motion. 

“What? No. No, Alicia, I wouldn’t hide that from you. We … There was a car accident, and Maggie lost the baby. When she was about six months along. There is no baby.” 

“That makes it worse,” Alicia says, even though Sloan would dispute that. “Excuse me. Sloan, Don, thanks so much for your hospitality, but I’m going to head out.” 

“Alicia —” Jim starts to go after her as she storms out, but she spins around and says, “Not now, Jim,” and he stops, watching her leave. 

Mac swiftly steps up to slap him on the back of the head. “You arse,” she says, and Sloan doesn’t even have the heart to tell her not to swear. “What the hell, Jim? You didn’t mention that Maggie was pregnant?”

“I didn’t think it was relevant!” Jim says.

“How could it not be?” Sloan asks before she could stop herself.

“Tell me why it is,” he argues back. “It’s in the past, it’s done.” 

“The fact that you didn’t want to tell her is exactly why it’s relevant!” Mac screeches. “You are a dense, idiotic, stupid man!” 

“Mac, just because he’s an unbelievable putz doesn’t mean you have to get that sloppy with language,” Will says drolly. “Come on, you’re better than that.” 

“Hey, guys, Alicia just, like, ran past me — is everything alright?” Neal asks as he walks in, a nervous Maggie at his side. Surveying the group, he says, “Ok, maybe not. It’s too late for me to back out of the room slowly, isn’t it?”

“For you, oh yeah,” Mac says. “Maggie, can you go, please?”

“Me? Go?”

“Yes. Please,” Mac repeats. 

“For crying out loud, I’m not a leper —” Maggie starts.

“Mags, can you please?” Jim says, and Sloan’s heart breaks because he looks like he’s about to cry just anticipating the beatdown from Mac. 

Maggie stares at her ex, nods and exits. 

Mac waits a few beats until Maggie is well out of earshot. “Neal, can you explain why, hypothetically, it might not be a great idea to not tell your new wife that your last relationship ended with the death of your child?”

Neal does a double take. “You sure I can’t … With Maggie? No? Alright.” 

“What the hell were you thinking, man?” Mac exasperates at Jim. “Do you seriously not understand why this might be problematic?”

“I … Yes. I do. Alright? I do.” 

“I have a party to chaperone,” Sloan says. She knows when it is not wise to be around Kenzie, and this genuinely seems like something she doesn’t want to be a party to. “I will leave you all to this, though. Enjoy.” 

“Yup, you know what? It’s my birthday, and I’m … I’m gonna celebrate,” Don says, also backing out of the room slowly. 

“Can I go with them?” Sloan hears Neal ask as she leaves.

“No you cannot,” Mac snaps back. “You stay too, Will.” 

Once they’re safely out of the Mac Zone, she and Don share a furtive look, then she breaks into giggles. “I’m sorry. That’s completely inappropriate. I just …” 

“Yeah, that’s pretty unbelievable,” Don says. “He’s a lot more fucked up than I gave him credit for.” 

“I feel sorry for him.”

“Me too,” he replies, absently running a hand up her arm. “Hey. Thank you for this. You didn’t … This is a lot. You didn’t have to do this.”

“I wanted to,” she insists, pressing a kiss up to him. “Happy birthday, Don.” 

They swirl back into the party, where Reese immediately finds her. “Hello to you too, Reese,” she says, amused, after she nearly knocks him over. 

“Nice party, Sloan,” he says.

“Thanks. It’s tough being me sometimes — brilliant economist, incisive newscaster, best legs on TV, attentive mother, and kickass party planner — but, hey, someone has to do it. What can I do you for?”

“You could come back to my network.” 

She smiles. “That’s it? OK.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.” 

Reese grins, one of the pure grins she’s even seen him grin. “Let’s talk Monday.”

“Let’s talk Monday,” she agrees. 

It’s not perfect. It won’t be perfect. It, like most things past the age of twenty-five, past the age when you have family and priorities and obligations, is a compromise, is done to maintain some semblance of forward motion and purpose. It solves a problem and potentially creates twelve more. With it, she wins by losing. She pauses for a second to wonder when new beginnings stopped feeling like triumphs, like the universe was expanding itself outward for her, and started to feel melancholic — after all, now any new decision means that all the old decisions, pathways once full of promise, are closed to her, for now and for ever. But it is, she knows resolutely, her choice, and she’s sticking with it. And that’s enough. 

Besides, it’s not like she has any time to brood or contemplate or philosophize. She turns, and Maggie is standing beside her. “What’s going on?” she asks.


	12. Chapter Eleven -- Jim

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! Thanks to all who are still sticking with this. Hopefully it's still fun for y'all. My hope is to get this (and Hearts) wrapped up or nearly wrapped up by the time the final season starts. I see this piece having about 6-8 more chapters. This is a pretty big chapter for all those reading for Maggie and Jim, and I hope it lives up to your expectations.
> 
> I think it's necessary on this chapter to throw out a disclaimer that all the chapters, but especially this one, are told from the perspective of a character. So what is actually happening is not directly what they're perceiving or expressing. It's why I'll rewrite the same interactions from multiple perspectives - the truth of a situation is often in between how characters are processing it. Frequently, characters lie to one another and themselves, for a host of reasons, and hopefully how/why they're justifying their behaviors and thoughts to themselves are apparent. With that, I give you Jimmy Harper's take on Don's birthday party and its aftermath :)

_Jim_

_An honorable human relationship — that is, one in which two people have the right to use the word "love" — is a process, delicate, violent, often terrifying to both persons involved, a process of refining the truths they can tell each other. — Adrienne Rich_

_September 29_

"In my defense, Mac, I do understand how this might _seem_ like a poor choice," Jim repeats, hands in the air, for what feels like the eighth time in five minutes.

"Do you, now? Well, that's great!" Mac says sarcastically. She's still at her most revved up, pacing and gesticulating and generally looking like she might start emanating sparks before spontaneously combusting with a furious squeal. "I'm glad you _understand_ how it _seems_."

"Why the hell do you care, Mac?" he says, frustration lacing his voice.

"Yeah, why _do_ you care?" Neal, who still looks like he wishes the floor would swallow him, says.

"I _care_ because I am slowly becoming convinced that our friend Jim here is losing his mind, bit by bit like it's Hansel and Gretl's bread loaf or an iceberg melting into the ocean because of global warming, and I find that _concerning_ ," she rages. "You need to leave, OK. You fall in love, great. You get married, wonderful. You finally come home, even better! But the lying and the secrecy —"

"You're seeing what you want to see, because you're still mad that I left," he throws back. It's petty and he's not even sure he believes it, but _Christ_ can she be overbearing.

"Oh yeah? Convince me."

"Convince you of what?"

"Your _point_ , old man. Convince me why I'm wrong to think that you're _losing your mind_ ," she roars the last part. "Convince me of your reasons for hiding this from your wife. Because, honestly, do you _get_ how disrespectful this was to that poor girl? For Christ's sake, Jim, she's _eleven_. You told me you told her."

"I _told_ you she knew enough. Which she did. And _you're_ doing a great job of convincing me that what you're saying has _absolutely nothing_ to do with the _fact_ that you don't like Alicia! You don't like this all happened when I was away and that you had no control over whom I fell for. You don't like that it means I don't want to get back together with Maggie and pretend the last four years haven't happened. You don't like that the accident happened coming back from your beach house. What I choose and don't choose to tell my wife is between me. And her."

Mac turns to Neal and shakes her head. "I'm done. I'm out." She flaps her hands backwards in a _fuck it all_ gesture, then steps toe to toe to Jim. "Grow up, Jim. Grow up." She backs out of the room and tosses a harsh "Bye" at them.

And then there were three. "You know, you say Alicia didn't need to know, but her expression tells me that she might've _wanted_ to know," Will says mildly, as if they've been discussing the potential for rain this whole time. "And, I don't know, honesty sounds like a pretty good policy in a relationship."

"It was in the past, and it's between me and Alicia," he repeats evenly. It's his last inch, he realizes, and he's not giving it up.

"If you didn't want it to be brought up, then why the fuck did you bring her to New York? It certainly doesn't seem like something she wanted, Jim." Will sighs. "Listen. I don't know where the fuck your head is anymore. I have no idea if you love your wife or don't love her or are proving something to Mac or Maggie or yourself or just need a really expensive therapist, but whatever it is, Jimmy, you're old enough and smart enough to figure it the fuck out, and even if you're not, you're definitely old enough and smart enough to figure out what the fuck you need. Now I have a pissed-off wife and you have a pissed-off wife, and I'm going to go deal with my pissed-off wife. I'd suggest you do the same, but don't worry, I know it's all your _choice_ what you do from here on out." Will walks slowly — hell, he practically meanders — out the door, and his studied disregard and contempt make Jim feel far worse than Mac's yelling did.

And then it's just Neal, who heaves a sigh. "I get _why_ you didn't want to tell her — really, I do. But you do get why people think it's unfair and disrespectful, right?"

"Yeah, Neal, I do," he says, letting out a breath. And he really, really does. He also knows why he did not tell her.

"Ok," Neal says. Satisfied, he stands, and heads towards the door. Then he pivots. "You know, the nice things about friends is that you can leave for a while, you can kind of treat them like shit, and you can have a couple of bad years, but they'll still support you. At least these friends."

"Got it," he says. Neal pauses again, like he wants to say something, but then turns out of the doorframe.

Once he's gone Jim realizes he doesn't have any escape route from this party. He needs to leave, he needs to avoid Mac, and he needs to find Alicia. He waits a few minutes, takes a deep breath, mentally plots the fastest way out (he's not sure, but he thinks it involves cutting through the kitchen to the laundry room and out at an angle). Finally, he peeks around the corner. The party is still in full swing down the hall, so he cuts in the opposite direction. He's turning into the kitchen when — "Jim! Hi," Maggie says, in a too-bright voice that means someone has filled her in. Or she could have deduced it. She's no dummy.

"Mags," he says, actually physically rocking back on his heels as he slips back into the familiar nickname. "Hey. Listen, you know — about earlier —"

"You know what, no need. Sloan filled me in."

"Oh. OK," he says. "Well — I'm actually — trying to slip out."

"Right! Of course," she says, then lets him pass. "Jim?" she calls as he's sneaking back into the kitchen. "I just want you to know — I understand why you did it. I know Mac probably doesn't, but — I do. If that counts for anything."

He stares at her, this woman whom he once wanted to marry, this beautiful, fragile, scarred, strong woman. "Of course it matters, Maggie." He wonders how different Don's fortieth birthday party would've been if it were him here with Maggie and Caroline. He wonders what Caroline would've looked like. Dark-haired like him, or alabaster-skinned like Maggie? It's not a desire to be with Maggie, not at all, but he feels like that life would be far less painful.

"Well. I get it, is all I'm saying," she smiles crookedly. "Anyways. You should make your escape."

"Do you want to get a drink?" he says in a rush.

She takes a step back. Blinks. "I don't think — that's not a good idea, Jim."

"Not as — not as anything," he reassures he quickly. "The mess I've made with Alicia — I want to fix that. Hell, I need to fix that. But before … everything, we were friends once. We did it badly, most of the time, but we were friends, Maggie, good friends, and I … miss that."

She softens. "I brought a date," she says. "I can't just …"

"Right. Of course," he sighs. "I was probably just using you to avoid, you know, everything else that's going catastrophically wrong in my life. I should go."

"Wait, Jim," she tugs his arm to turn him around when he tries to walk past her. "I could have Brent take me home. And meet you in, say, an hour."

He pauses, but only briefly. "That sounds great, actually. Hang Chew's?"

"Sure thing," she says, and turns on her heel.

He manages to make it out without running into anybody, though he feels guilty — he should text Sloan to apologize. He goes to Hang Chew's to wait, downs a drink idly, then a second.

He notices her come in almost immediately. She's changed from sundress to jeans and a blue Oxford and those mens' loafers that all the women are wearing these days. When she sees him she flinches but comes to join him, sitting gingerly on the stool next to him. He raises the glass in acknowledgement.

She shakes her head, still not entirely comfortable to be there. "You remember how our last fight — _the_ fight — started?"

He thinks, then shakes his head. "No. Honestly, it's a blur."

"You met Hallie for drinks after work," she says, stretching and flexing her fingers and staring intently at them. "And I did not like that a lot."

He chuckles uneasily at the irony. "And here we are." He realizes it's a little reckless, what he's doing; he should be finding Alicia, fighting for them. but he needs to be here first. Because here he can maybe get a better understanding of why she did what she did, which led to what he did.

"Yeah. Here we are," she folds her hands together tightly and leans forward, her body tight as a drum. "How is she, by the way?"

He starts. "Alicia?"

"No," she says, giving him a Mac-patented 'Jim-you're-so-dumb' look. " _Hallie_. How is Hallie?"

"She's, uh, she's good, yeah. I think. I haven't really spoken to her …" since that fight. "Last thing I heard was she was based in D.C." They'd made it four months after the campaign, but honestly, living together had proven to be too much. She'd taken a job in Los Angeles, and they were over.

"I think I've seen her byline on Vox," Maggie supplies unnecessarily. There's a pause.

"So Brandon seemed nice."

" _Brent_ ," she corrects. "His name is Brent. And … yeah. He seems that way."

"Where'd you meet him?"

"Through, um, through Lisa, actually. He's a coworker of her husband."

"Ah. How is Lisa?"

"She's … she's good. Working as a buyer at Bloomingdale's now, in their accessories department. And she's married. Obviously. She's got a daughter, Hazel, who's two. And she's pregnant again. Due in early spring. They don't know the gender yet but she thinks it's another girl. She wants to name her Frances."

"Wow. Good for her."

"Yeah."

"And Brent is —"

"—A coworker-friend, yeah. Lisa's husband, Matt, is a forensic accountant. So he does … that too."

"That's nice. Very stable." He means it as a compliment.

"I guess. I mean, yes, he seems very nice. I don't know him too well; we've been on three dates. But he's ... he's been divorced, which I like, since he has a little history too. I like him. We'll see. We'll see." She shrugs.

"You're doing a really good job on _NewsNight_ ," he says. It's the first time they've really talked, and he feels he needs to say that.

"Thanks. Don't sound so surprised."

"I'm not surprised. You've always been good."

"And now you're just lying, which is offensive."

"You were young once … It happens to the best of us."

"Even you?"

"Well, no, but we all know I'm gifted," he jokes.

"Yeah, that's the term for what you are," she snarks back.

"There are many terms," he concedes. "But really. You are. How's working with Elliot?"

"He's great. It's been a rocky transition, with Don and now no Don and soon a new EP and guest hosts and now Elliot, but it's good. I like it. It's never going to be the same show that Mac and Will ran — not with Elliot, and especially once Don takes over for Charlie and then Reese — but that might be a good thing, I think."

"You think he's really going to get Reese's job?"

She considers. "Yeah. I think so. Not immediately but in a couple years. He's the right man for the job. He's principled like Mac and Charlie and Will, but he's pragmatic too, which they're _not,_ and he gets shit done. It's a good combination. And even when he's an asshole, he's usually right. And people respect that. And he's a hell of a lot more likable since he married Sloan. Seriously, when the APs find out I used to date him, they're always so confused why I would have given that up. I have to explain that the reason he's a good guy _is_ Sloan. The two of them can be like an ACN power couple, and everyone loves power couples," she sounds wistful.

"Sloan's at Bloomberg," he points out, though he feels like he's missing something. He feels very out of the loop. He's felt that way since returning.

"She'll come back," Maggie non-explains dismissively.

He crinkles his forehead. His head hurts. "Am I missing something?"

"What do you mean?"

"Am I missing something? You seem to know a lot more, about everything, than I do."

"OK? I don't think that's true."

"You know about what's happening with Don and Sloan, you know what's happening with Will and Mac …"

"You're asking why, since I was the one that ruined everything, and you were the one who went abroad since your heart was broken like Mac did, why they all just feel sad about me but you think they're be mad at you?" she deduces. "You think they're choosing me, like there's a choice to make?"

"No." But yes. "You didn't ruin everything."

"Bullshit. I was the one that broke first and gave up. Let's all be clear about that. But now … There wasn't a choice for anyone to make, to side with me or you. You made your choice first, Jim, and it was to get married. And that's great. Alicia seems nice, she really does. You have good taste," she seems to genuinely mean that. "Nobody's mad at you. I think it's pathologically impossible for Mac to actually ever be mad at you; you're her guy. She can and does get mad at Will, at Sloan, at Don. At me. But you're her _guy._ You're the guy that followed her in the trenches when she had nobody. She loves you in this fierce, unrelenting, overprotective way. She can't get mad at you."

"She's pretty mad now."

"She's scared out of her mind because she think you've lost yours. Everyone else can see that."

"I haven't lost my mind."

"I'm not sure you ever had a mind to lose," she teases, then gets back to business. "Anyways. Nobody's mad at you. But rightly or wrongly, everyone thinks you coming back married will make my sadness even sadder and there's nothing that makes a bunch of people who have toddlers more nervous than someone who lost her kid. They think I'm unhinged and they're trying to make sure I don't lose it all over again."

"You don't really think that, do you?"

"I think that's how they think."

"Does me getting married make your sadness even sadder?" he asks bluntly.

She appraises him carefully. "Who says I'm still sad?" she says.

"Maggie, there are exactly two people who lost something in that accident. I know you're still sad because I'm still sad. Christ … Do you ever think about her? Not us, her. About what she'd be like, look like, act like, whenever you see Max or Nora? They'd all play together, you know." He flags down the waitress for another drink.

Maggie's quiet for a long time. "You really shouldn't have another," she says. "You really should go find Alicia and fix this, Jim."

"I think about her every day," he says. "Just so you know."

"You think I _don't_?" she hisses. "Christ, Jim, how terrible do you think I am? Every day. Every kid in the park. Every stroller on the street. It's no longer a conscious thought, it's a … bone-deep part of my identity. I don't remember what it's like to not have lost her. So yes. Every day."

He's quiet for a long time. It's nice, commiserating with Maggie about this. She really is the only one in the world that can understand where he's coming from on a lot of things. "I don't think they understand, you know? How you can still think about her and be shaped by that and still move on, because that's what you have to do. You don't get a choice. I think Mac feels you have to continue to repeat your mistakes and rehash your arguments until you get the happy ending. I'd never want to repeat that day. I just want to get as far away from it, and she keeps going Jack Shephard on us."

"Of course she does," Maggie says. "But losing a kid isn't cheating on the love of your life. She had agency, she got to keep pretending her life was totally under her own control." She finishes her drink and stands. "Your marriage doesn't make my sadness sadder, Jim. If anything it makes it easier. Makes me feel like I have permission to move on, that maybe I can move on. Like you did. If you did. Hell, it makes me feel like you're not punishing me anymore."

"Why would I be punishing you?" He wants to say _I was driving_ , but he can't.

"Because the accident … Other people, different people, people who were not me, could have worked through it. Could have shared grieving. Sloan and Don could have. Will and Mac could have. Luke and Laura, Elizabeth and Darcy, could have. And I couldn't, and I left."

"I never … _never_ blamed you for that."

"Well, I did," she says with a joyless smile. "Anyways. I'm going. I'll see you at work, OK? You should call Alicia."

He nods. "Have a good night, Mags."

He has another drink, then unlocks his phone to call Alicia. Unsurprisingly, she doesn't pick up. "Hey," he says, his throat dry. "I know you're mad. And … I'm sorry. I'm going to be at home. If you can come, if you're not there, we can talk. I'd like that."

He wanders around the park for a while, then heads home. Unlocking the door quietly, he peeks his head in. The lights are all off, and he shuts the door with a soft _click._

"Hey," Alicia says from behind him.

He jumps. "You're … you're very stealthy."

"It's my womanly wiles," she says, making a joke without a hint of humor. She's changed from her pretty striped party dress into a pair of loose-fitting yoga pants and a purple zip-up from American Apparel. "You enjoy the rest of the party?"

"I didn't stay much longer," he mumbles.

She arches an eyebrow. "Oh really? Where've you been?"

"Went on a walk. Got a drink."

"Alone?" she asks.

He decides honesty is the best policy. "No. With Maggie."

"Oh, well that's just _fantastic_ ," she says, spitting the words as she gets winds up.

"Would you _listen_ , first? Before you get angry?"

"How can I _not_ be angry? Seriously! You choose not to tell me the biggest, most important part of your life from before you get married, and then instead of coming home to work it out you go out to a drink with her? Jim, I'm not somebody who gets jealous, but why'd you do that? It seems spiteful." She's the closest to tears I've ever seen her, and she's pacing frenetically. Normally, she's composed and vivacious. He loves that about her. "You need — help me understand this. You need to tell me everything."

He sighs. "Maggie and I had kind of a — we liked each other, but had a lot of bad timing, when we first started working at ACN. She was dating Don —"

"Don Keefer, Don? Married-to-Sloan-Sabbith-with-three-kids Don?"

"It was a long time ago," he shrugs. "Maggie and Don broke up in 2011, and Sloan and Don were married basically a year later. Maggie and I didn't get together until June 2013, and a little under a year later, we found out she was pregnant. It was definitely unexpected, but we went with it. Rented out a bigger space together, started buying stuff, picked out a name we both liked, and started babysitting Max Keefer, who was maybe three or four months old at the time. I was terrible at doing the diapers."

"Good to know," Alicia interjects in a tone that's halfway between caustic and wry. There might be hope.

"In August, Mac and Will invited us up to the beach house they'd just bought. It was the six of us plus Max, for a weekend. Don and Sloan and Max left pretty early on Sunday so they wouldn't interrupt Max's bedtime routine. Maggie and I decided to head back after a late dinner on Sunday. She was pretty uncomfortable and wanted to stay in her bed that night. Mac and Will were going to drive back before work Monday morning, since it was raining."

He sighs as he gets to the toughest part. "I was driving, and the car skidded into oncoming traffic. We were hit on her side, and the impact and angle knocked the car over. She was momentarily knocked out, which was … terrifying. I was beat up, but nothing too major — broken collarbone and some bruises. She had a concussion and a couple broken ribs, a partially collapsed lung. She'd be OK, though. But when we got to the hospital they couldn't find a heartbeat. A couple more tests, but the baby was dead. They did a D&C that night. She was about 22 weeks along."

"That's awful, Jim," Alicia says, a hand pressed against her mouth and tears pooling in the corners of her eyes.

"Yeah. And neither of us were particularly equipped to handle it well. We got into a huge fight about something stupid, and then the next day she flew to Atlanta to interview for a CNN job. She took it and left. I flew down to try and bring her back, but … it didn't work. Then a job opened up overseas and I took it. And that was … basically four years ago. So that's it. Now you know."

She's quiet. "First off, I'm so sorry. That sounds awful."

He nods. "Yeah. Well …"

"And I get why it would be hard to tell me," she continues. "But I always thought that when you love someone enough to want to spend the rest of your life with them, you would tell them everything. Even if it was hard. Because you wanted to. Because you want … that person, at the end of the day, to know everything about you. To be like the witness to your life, you know? And I told you plenty of stuff that was hard for me to talk about. Because I wanted you to know _me_."

"Al, I know, but it's different —"

"Different than talking about my parents' divorce because of my father's alcoholism? Or about my cousin Amal's suicide? What about my aunt's death from cancer, how my friend Sara drowned when I was 16, or about how my first boyfriend was _not_ a nice guy? Do those not count, Jim?" He realizes then how unfair he's been to Alicia, discounting life experience for age, using privilege to disguise hardship. She's experienced plenty of the little tiny tragedies that, when taken in sum, have the potential to overwhelm someone. And yet she's still a good person. "Bad things happen to _everyone_ , Jim. I don't want you to hide the sad, uncomfortable parts of you from me. But the fact that you didn't trust me enough … that hurts."

"Alicia, I'm … sorry. I'm really, truly sorry. It's not a part of my life I like talking or even … thinking about, and that's not an excuse. I'm sorry."

"Is there anything else?"

"Anything else?"

"That I should know. Jim, I moved continents, gave up a job I loved, left my family. I'm in this. I just want to know that you are too. Is there anything else I should know?"

He sighs. "In seventh grade I stole gum; in 12th I cheated on a math quiz. In college my mom found a bag of weed under my bed and I told her it was my roommate's, and she believed me. I got shot in the ass my first assignment overseas, but I also almost got stabbed trying to get Mac out of a riot. I didn't sleep for three days in Landstuhl until she was out of the woods. I thought she was going to die and it would be my fault. I didn't realize that she'd gone overseas to get over Will, so no matter what it was his fault that she was there, and I kinda hated the guy for the next year. There's a YouTube video floating around somewhere from 2011 where Maggie's screaming at a _Sex and the City_ tour bus about how much it sucks to fall in love with her roommate's best friend — which is me — and I was actually on the bus. It became a minor viral sensation that year. I think it has like 20,000 views. Oh, and I cheat at Uno. Even against my seven-year-old niece. I have zero compunction."

"Well I knew _that_ one. You're really very obvious when you cheat," she jokes. Then she's quiet, digging her toe into the rug. "Maggie shouted at a _Sex and the City_ tour bus?"

"Yeah. I was dating her roommate, she was dating Don, it was a mess … And it was a long time ago."

"But then you got together two years later, and were about to have a baby. Do I need to be worried?"

"About what?"

"About Maggie?"

"And me? … No. Not at all. Listen. Maggie and I went through something awful. It was a big test, and we failed. There's no coming back from that." He reaches out, puts a hand on her shoulder before hugging her. "I'm here. I fucked up, I'm sorry, and I'm here. I love you, and I want to be here. With you. I'm choosing _here_ , OK?"

She kisses him softly. "Thank you," she says, then hugs him tightly. He doesn't know where they're going tomorrow, but for now — it's enough.


	13. Chapter Twelve--Don

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, uh ... hi! My apologies for letting this story slip to the backburner; as I wrote in a few author's notes over on my other story ("Hearts are Strong!" go read it!), I wanted to focus on that story since the s3 canon is going to completely blow it out of the water. The good news is I'm rapidly closing in on the ending for that one, so I had some time to crank this chapter out. This has a brief time-jump (I estimate about 3-4 weeks from the last batch of chapters) and is kind of the start of "Act 2" of the story (I see it having about 3 acts, though I'm estimating, at most, 24 total chapters. This one sets up a couple central stories, which hopefully are interesting.
> 
> If you're still reading, thanks! Would love to hear what you're thinking.

"I sat down next to her. Took her hand. This can work, I said. All we have to do is try."

― Junot Díaz, This Is How You Lose Her

 

October

"Let's talk about women," Reese says, barging into his office.

Don looks up with a quick eyebrow flick. "While I appreciate the faith that you, my boss's boss, one of New York's most eligible bachelors for seventeen years running, is showing by coming to me, lowly married schlub, for relationship advice, Sloan once described my dating technique as 'randomly tumbling into women sideways and hoping they break up with me first.' So I'm afraid I can't help you with Roan."

"Who?" Reese asks blankly.

"I'm not your mother, my reaction to you pretending to forget the name of the last woman you dated won't be very funny."

Reese grins cockily. "She's not the last woman I dated. I broke up with Roan in August."

"Of course you did."

"I actually kind of like the one I'm dating now," Reese says.

"College degree or no?"

"Sloan's a catch," Reese drawls. "How'd you get her to date you, marry you, and pop out three kids, exactly?"

"Honestly? We got into a huge fight outside a bar when it was freezing, I made her cry, and kissed her to apologize. Ten months later we got married."

"Thanks for clarifying that I'm never taking dating advice from you. Let's talk about other women."

"Eighteen to forty-nines?"

"Hell, I'd take thirty-fives to forty-nines. Did you see the numbers last night?"

"I did. And the ones last week."

"What do you think?"

"I wasn't a huge fan, personally."

"They're not good, Don."

"They're not, but they're as not-good as they've been for a while."

"Alright, we've got Elliot starting up at News Night in a month, and Sloan coming on at two p.m. We'll promo the hell out of them, but what else? We need to start living every week like it's Shark Week."

"I agree, Trace," he sighs. He's actually beginning to think, in his heart of hearts, that bringing back Sloan and Elliot a Band-Aid solution when surgery was called for. Both will bring comparatively huge ratings and insta-credibility — they're both big draws, with a long history with viewers and solid, trustworthy reputations. Sloan's been earning nearly a million viewers at noon on Bloomberg, which is unheard-of. Elliot's is America's dreamboat dad, and will bring a sort of Brian Williams-esque feel to News Night. It also opens up an opportunity for Scottie, the backup morning anchor and dedicated pocket-square aficionado, a chance to break out, and Don's going to put serious money behind the kid. He's talented.

But the two of them kick the can down the road: They'll have temporary relief via higher ratings, but ACN is still a fundamentally ailing, borderline-fucked media organization. And it's Don's job to ensure that Reese's worse instincts — to lean into AWM's more profitable ventures, to turn ACN away from doing the news well and into an infotainment network — aren't borne out. And it's not fucking easy. Don has rarely felt like he didn't have his shit under control at work; the last time he felt that way, he guesses, was right after he took over Right Now. His career was in borderline-fucking crisis mode then. Now, it's back in that place. And while his personal life is in a light-years better place this time around, the tension over the last several months about Sloan's career had been an unwelcome blast from the past. He's tired, and tense, and he's worried he's not being a good provider or good at his job, and the producer inside of him is freaking out a little.

"Look," Don says, "we have five problems. First, talent. We were low on it. Second, programming — we didn't have the right programs at the right time. Third — quality. What we're putting on isn't always the best journalism out there. It's related to the first, but we have to be better, faster. Fourth, image. Nobody knows why the fuck they should watch us, except we don't yell as much as the blowhards on Fox. And finally, fifth, digital. People don't expect news to set the tone, they expect to select news anymore. Cable's been cushioned a bit because we have other revenue streams, but if we're going to compete as a media organization we need to think about how and when to attract viewers. That means investing heavily in digital. We fixed the first, we're weak on the second, improving on the third, and are lost as hell on the fourth and fifth. I'll talk to Mac and the heads of the news desks and Charlie, but we gotta get the programming and brand right."

"My mother's going to want a plan."

"Rome wasn't built in a day."

"At least get me the schematics," Reese says. "By … next week. Doesn't need to be tomorrow."

After Reese leaves, Don bangs his head against his desk. It feels good.

He comes home late that night — past nine — and the apartment is quiet and dark. He pads into the kitchen, hoping that Sloan has maybe left some food in the kitchen. She hasn't — just a pile of dishes and a pot crusted with mac'n'cheese. He loads the dishwasher and cleans the pot so Jazmin, the housekeeper who comes Tuesdays and Fridays, doesn't have to. Then he heads upstairs.

"Hey," he says softly, entering the bedroom. Sloan's slanted against the headboard, laptop in front of her and The Minority Report with Larry Wilmore quietly on the TV. She looks exhausted. Beautiful, but completely exhausted. Emerson, her PJ top twisted around her, is sleeping on her side next to Sloan, her thumb in her mouth. "She OK?" he nods his head toward her.

"Yeah," she says quietly. "She just was having a lot of trouble sleeping and I didn't want her waking Susannah."

"Want me to take her back?" he checks.

"Let's leave her for a bit. She just went down and she'll wake up." Sloan stares tiredly at her computer.

"You eat dinner?" he asks.

"Not really," she shakes her head. She's distant, tonight. "The kids wanted mac'n'cheese, which is disgusting, so I just ate the broccoli they passed on."

"Do you want to order something? Or I can make soup. Or sandwiches."

She lifts one shoulder. "I'm not hungry, but I will be honest and say I'll probably steal whatever you eat." Her smirk is flirty and genuine, and his chest, his whole body, relaxes. She has that effect on him.

He laughs and kisses her temple as she smirks. He pops into the girls' room and kisses Susannah, asleep in her pink toddler bed (Will had helped convert and paint the white cribs last month; Sloan had cried a little). Next is Max's room — he's not in the lofted treehouse bed, but Don notices two tiny feet sticking out of the teepee in the corner, and he crawls in to find Max passed out on top of a sleeping back. He kisses his sweaty boy-forehead, then heads downstairs again.

The kitchen is well-stocked, thanks to Jaz's efforts. He heats up some of her homemade tomato-basil soup and constructs a towering turkey, white cheddar, tomato, and avocado sandwich. He loads them both onto a tray with a cup of tea and a bowl of pineapple for Sloan, and treads carefully upstairs. "Brought you tea," he announces as he enters the bedroom.

"Thank you. You are actually the most thoughtful," Sloan says, taking the cup gratefully. She scoots closer to Emma so he can slide in the bed. "You know, if I ever talked to the awful Young Urban Mommies at the park, I would brag about you all the time. Then they'd hit on you at all the preschool plays out of jealousy."

"Too bad the YUMmies are scary as hell."

"So scary," she agrees. "Oh my god. Is that pineapple?"

"Yup. Scooped it from the Tupperware myself." He passes it to her.

"Again. I would brag about you so much," she kisses him full on the lips and smiles.

"How was work?" he sighs, deflating into the bed next to her. He's tired. He's frequently tired. Being a working parent — even with all the help they get — leads to a sort of bone-deep fatigue that he no longer even notices, until he's suddenly got a second alone or with Sloan. He frequently just feels like a perpetual-motion machine.

"I am ready for my contractually mandated month off," she sighs, shifting into him. She had put in her notice at Bloomberg, announced publicly that 'while grateful for the many opportunities it had offered' she would be 'returning home to ACN, which launched my news career and which is still, in many ways, my home.' The decision had gotten the publicity she had grimly predicted, which was far more than he had expected; the Times had used it as a jumping-off point for a column on whether or not ACN could 'make it' anymore. The article had mentioned, "Sabbith is married to Don Keefer, ACN's SVP for primetime news and widely considered a front-runner for president of the network, whenever Mrs. Lansing retires and her son assumes her mantle. The two, who have three children under five and a two-story condo on Riverside Drive, met at ACN and are considered unusually close." The mention of the kids and the apartment location had irritated both of them, but what really took the cake was the 'unusually close' line: What the fuck did that even mean? How was spouses being close 'unusual'? New York mag had called Sloan's agent and asked to do a profile of her during her first several weeks on the job to write about how she balanced motherhood and work; Sloan had not-so-politely told them where to stick it. From the outside, at least, it seemed Sloan's deepest fears about taking the job were actually being realized.

On the inside, though, things were better than they were six weeks ago. Something they'd learned around year two of marriage was to stick to the terms after a fight was resolved. Don't hold shit over the other's head. They had moved on. It was the past. Sloan was coming to ACN with clear eyes and on her own her terms, and they were going to try and make that work. He suspected that once she officially started, they would find plenty more to argue about. And until then, they had childcare to arrange and vegetables and bedtimes to negotiate and bills to pay and doctor's appointments to schedule. The upside of being so constantly busy and parenting three kids together was they had little time to argue or discuss feelings or principles; they had to simply do, and do well, and getting through things together usually brought equilibrium back. In this case, it had.

"Also, I'm going up to Boston Thursday to interview Larry Summers. I'm leaving after the broadcast, doing the interview that evening, and then flying back Friday A.M. before the show. If we ask Cristina to stay until six-thirty can you make it home then, and handle the evening?"

"Honestly? Probably."

"Fine. I'm going to need you to call Lily and have her spend the night too."

"Last time we had her spend the night she asked for two hundred bucks. She's extorting us."

"I call that being a good capitalist. What else are we going to do but pay her?"

She has a point. "Good point."

"Most of mine are, mister," she says lightly, taking a very satisfied bite of pineapple. She picks up two folders, presumably prep for Summers, and balances them on a knee. The pineapple is on a thigh.

"So Max didn't want to sleep in his bed?"

"No, and Emerson wouldn't sleep at all," she shakes her head and shoves three cubes of fruit into her mouth before tipping her neck back and resting her skull on the headboard. She stares at the ceiling and swallows. "Do you ever sit back and think about how badly they're going to steamroll us when they're all teenagers at the same time?"

"I try not to," he admits. She swipes a tomato that loosened itself from his sandwich.

The episode of Minority Report wraps up, and she toggles to the next episode in the DVR queue. Larry starts his monologue as they eat in silence. "I have a documentary on the invention of Scrabble DVRed too, if you're game," she volunteers. "It looks really interesting."

"Scrabble?" he laughs.

"Don't write it off just because I regularly own your ass at the game," she retorts. "It's fascinating. The inventor used a frequency analysis to determine what point values to assign to each letter."

"He couldn't just think, 'Hey, nobody ever uses 'j,' but every other word uses 'e'?" he laughs.

"That line of thinking is exactly how you've landed in last place the last five years in fantasy," she smirks. "Fine, I've got like six episodes of The Daily Show recorded. We can watch that."

"You know, the least you could do is watch ACN," he pouts. "If you're going to watch news."

"Teri at nine? No thanks," she snorts. "ACN might sign my paychecks soon enough but I pay my own cable bill. I had a long day, and I had an absurd day, because all my days are long and absurd, Don. We have three kids under the age of five, Don. Three! I want to laugh."

"Fine," he says, putting the tray on the floor and scooting closer to her. She leans into him and turns the volume up. Jon Stewart makes a crack about the president, and pieces fit together in Don's mind. "Live every week like it's Shark Week," he repeats.

"What the hell? Why are you quoting 30 Rock?" Sloan looks up.

"Why hasn't a network done a satirical news show?" he asks.

"Because we do real news," she points out in a 'duh' tone. "The lines get blurry."

"Then a viral video, monologue, talk show kind of thing," he says, getting excited. "Think about it: Fallon, Stewart, Colbert, they're all getting millions of viewers at 11, and we're re-airing News Night and getting 200K. That's untapped revenue. Who says a news network can't run a talk show at 11?"

"And what's next? A The View rip off at 10 a.m.? Don, you're running a news network with a credibility issue. There are real issues happening in the world, real things that people need to know about."

"There are. And we need to tell them and report it. But we're not optimizing that time period," he says. He starts thinking. "Maybe we're doing this wrong."

"Doing what wrong? Remember, I just signed a contract to work for you, so please don't say you're doing things wrong."

"The highest-rated stuff in primetime is either polemical or entertainment," he says. "It's not the news. Why is that?"

"Because people are magpies drawn to shiny things," she says.

"What if we made news shiny?"

"Then we would turn into Fox or MSNBC."

"I'm serious," he says. "What if, on normal nights, we turned one hour — maybe, nine p.m. — over to special programming? Scheduled it like a regular network — you get this series of documentaries on Monday, you have this … travel series on Tuesday, this in-depth programming on Wednesdays. True crime on Thursdays. Move News Night up so it's hitting when people are watching dinner, but give them less … grind and grit during primetime. Teach them, inform them, but don't make them think they're getting that. Close out the night with a satire at 11. We should have the next John Oliver on our network."

"This is beginning to sound like CNN's strategy a couple years back, with the dolphin-hunting documentaries."

"They didn't commit so it failed, but it wasn't a bad strategy. Think about it. By eight p.m., people are going to have heard news all day. They can either hear spin, or they can learn something new. We can pull people in with personalities at that time of night, or we can pull them in with original content. You just said you didn't want to watch news; you wanted to unwind with a documentary about Scrabble. And you're a freaking news-junkie journalist. Let's up our serial nonfiction programming."

She pauses. "You would keep hard news through eight?"

"Double-down, probably," he muses out loud. "And I mean obviously, if the president speaks or there's a terrorist attack or whatever, we cut in and run special programming. But what if we did a, like a panels-and-interview show at eight — not directly topical, more informative documentary than anything else — an in-depth series at nine, and a softer wrap-up — the early evening news, something snazzy and fun — at ten? And then a talk show at eleven."

Sloan considers. "It's different, but it might work. If anyone can make it work, you can. But Don," she says. "if you gamble and this doesn't work out, it will put your promotion in jeopardy. Serious jeopardy. You know that, right?"

"That's not a sure thing yet."

"Yeah, and whether or not fall is coming isn't a sure thing either," she says dismissively. "I'm not saying this couldn't be great — I think you have the capacity to make it great — and I absolutely don't want to tell you to play it safe, because you're so much greater when you don't. I just wanted to … point out there are risks."

"Do you think I can do this?"

"I think you can do anything."

"Not what I asked. Do you think I could do this, make it successful?"

She shrugs. "I'm intrigued by it. It's interesting. And ACN needs something big to turn it around, and it's not more tweeting. It's not even being the best journalists in the country anymore, since people choose more than the media decree. It can either go polemical or big-picture, and everyone wants it to be the second. But Reese can't make that happen — he doesn't understand news, just ratings. Though he respects news, now. And Charlie can't make that happen — he doesn't understand business well enough, and he's too old-school to be innovative. Will and Mac, even when they were more involved, were too stubborn to get something huge, like this, through — they could make it work on their one show and in their office culture, but they weren't in a position to bring a huge corporate change about. They weren't good enough at relationships and compromise. But they're all great at picking talent, and they've all picked you. You've got all the qualities and skills to make it happen. If you think you can make this work, you should do it."

He smiles and kisses her hand. "Alright then."

"And I'm proud of you no matter what," she adds unnecessarily, and slightly sarcastically.

"Thanks, Mom," he teases back sarcastically.

"That was my supportive-wife schtick!" she laughs as he tickles her ribs and captures her lips in a kiss. They make out for a little bit before she pulls back with one last, lingering kiss. "Scrabble documentary?" she suggests.

"Fine," he groans, since there is a twenty-month-old in bed with them. She grabs the remote to find the program, then settles next to him sleepily. They settle into the sad tale of an unemployed architect when —

"Momma? Daddy? I had a bad dream," Max announces, rubbing his eyes sleepily. He hasn't called them that in a while, so something is clearly wrong. "So I can't sleep anymore in my room. I need to sleep here."

"Do you now, buddy?" Don asks. "What was the dream?"

Max bounds up to the bed and jumps next to a still-zonked-out Emerson. "There was a ghost in my teepee," he explains. "He's a night ghost so he only comes out when you shut your eyes, and then he gets into your brain through your nose. Thomas told me about them." Thomas is a kid in his pre-k class, and Don has long considered the kid (the son of a hedge-funder and a corporate attorney) as kind of an asshole-in-training.

There's a noise from the girls' room, and Sloan sucks in a breath. "I'll go check on that."

Negotiating Max back to bed when he's had a bad dream is always a lost cause — you have to let him fall asleep and then move him. Don shuts off the TV and the lights to tamp down the stimulation. Max keeps babbling, though he eventually begins to settle in with one final, "Daddy?"

"Yeah bud?"

"Can I get chocolate milk? It helps me sleep." His eyes are just a bit too wide to be little opportunist.

"You can have water," Don says firmly, getting up. Sloan enters, an unhappy-to-be-up Annie crying in her arms.

"Someone woke up alone and freaked out, and would it be bad parenting if we just slept in the guest bedroom?"

"No worse than giving them refined sugar," Don shrugs, scooting Emerson and Max toward him so there's room for Susannah. "Or letting them use the iPad."

"Oh, god, they're all going to be obese," Sloan groans as she deposits Susannah between her siblings and tugs her nightgown straight. Then Sloan flops on the other side of their three kids, far away from him.

It's a very crowded king that night.

The next morning around ten, he knocks on Will's door. "What?" Will barks.

"Someone's morning quickie get interrupted?" Don cracks. At Will's semi-sheepish glare, the blood drains from his face. "Oh. God." He hates being right.

"What do you want, Don?"

"That's what happens when you have kids, you know. All three kids ended up in our bed last night. It's the worst — Emerson's kicks are surprisingly strong."

"Sometimes Nora has nightmares, and it makes for … a long night," Will explains.

"Keep her away from Thomas van der Heuer then. Little asshole has Max convinced that night-ghosts can go into his nose while he's sleeping."

"Is he the blonde one in the stupid sweater vests? Who always wears ties?"

Don smirks. It's fun, being preschool comrades with Will and Mac. Gives them a little solidarity against the 92nd Street Y crowd. "Yup. Wait till you meet his dad at parents' night. His ties have a whole forum on YUMmies."

"On what?"

Shit. Mac is going to kill him for this. Will has never, and will never, resolve his issues with Internet people. "Young Urban Mommies. YUMmies. It's a blog and message board for the connected mothers. You've seen them — the ones in the yoga pants and sunglasses at the preschool? Two nannies but no job? They ... blog. Or comment. In their copious amounts of spare time, they blog and comment about … motherhood in Manhattan."

" ?" Will asks as he types. Shitshitshit.

"Yeah, but we don't —"

"Question: I am a Sam —"

"S-A-H-M, a stay at home mom —" He is so dead. Mac will bury him. Then she will yell at Sloan, who will bury him again.

"With two DSes — the fuck? Translation?"

"A DS is a darling son. We don't have to do this now-"

"— And I think the younger one is a sociopath. The hell is this place? What the actual fuck, Don? People write these things? People think these things?"

"I came with an actual question."

"I think we should focus on —"

"The thing that I, your boss, came to ask? Great. I think so too."

Will raises an eyebrow. "You're gonna trump-card me with that?"

"Yep, because if you keep going down this train, it's going to crash, and you're going to piss off Mac and blame me, and she'll tell Sloan, and that will make my life terrible. So yeah, cutting this off," he takes a deep breath. "Fox asked you to do a late-night talk show, about twelve years ago, right?" He's now convinced that more original nonfiction programming is the way to go, but he has to convince someone else about the talk-show idea before he tells Reese. Will is the most stubborn, skeptical person Don knows, and he has actually heard him say, many times, "back in my day." Unironically. He needs to convince Will first.

"Yeah, about twelve years ago," Will repeats.

"You'd have been good at it," Don says.

"I'm good at most things," Will says. "Do you have a point, or are you just trying to distract me-"

"I have a point," Don says quickly, before Will can get worked up again. "Why doesn't ACN have a show like that?"

"A talk show?"

"Yeah. Why can't a cable news network do a satirical take on journalism?"

"Gee, I don't know, maybe because the pioneering network is the comedy network? Or that half the time, they're making fun of our talent? I don't know where you went to journalism school, Donny —"

"Columbia, and where's your journalism degree from, again?"

"— but that's the definition of a conflict of interest. Come on now!" Will looks seriously aghast, like Don has let him down. He moves quickly.

"I'm not saying we wouldn't need to set parameters, and that it might look a little different. But Stewart and Colbert changed the news just as fundamentally as Murrow —"

"Are you fucking shitting me right now?" Will yells. "You don't invoke the name —"

"Where do more twenty- and thirtysomethings learn about PACs, and election fraud, and racism, and police brutality, and world events? Late night! There are actual studies linking John Oliver's reporting to increased donations to worthy causes. There's studies linking watching Stewart to increased civic activism. It's a different route but it's still worthy. They're skeptical journalists who treat the news with irreverence, masked as humor, which ain't a bad way to be accessible and hard-hitting. And, we get something like this right, we're redefining network news for the rest of the century. We need to get the young viewers, and monetize digital. And not for nothing, Will, but that'll build up our ability to go deep on everything else. I'm not asking if you're happy about the changes, I'm asking if, when you take a step back and start thinking rationally, whether you think this might, in fact, be a good and new way to do the news."

Will cocks his head, considering. "When you put it that way it's one of your less-terrible ideas."

"You have a way with praise, Will," he says ruefully. "You're almost Shakespeare."

"I have a five-year contract for almost thirty million dollars to do one TV show a week, and you're going to pay me no matter what," Will shrugs. "Charlie, with my complicitity, has been fucking up this network for years. It's your turn now."

He knocks on Reese's door next. Charlie is there as well, leaning back in his chair contemplatively. Alright then. "You know how you didn't want the schematics in a day? What if I have them anyways?"

"Hit me, Vito."

So he does. He outlines a pitch of ACN 2.0 — a late-night show, serial nonfiction programming during primetime, heavy on the digital. A cable network, in the truest sense of the word, first and foremost.

Reese grins. "There's something there," he says.

"I think so too," Charlie says.

Even though he knew it was a good idea, relief washes through Don. "That's what I thought."

"Great. So you'll do it," Reese says. "I want a plan to present, with names and ideas, to my mother next week. Budgets too."

He's about to reply when there's a sharp knock on the door. "Yeah!" Reese yells. "S'open."

Jim enters, then Maggie, both looking nervous. "What's up?" Don asks.

"You remember Matt Ruhle?" Jim asks.

"One of our freelance videographers?" Don says.

"Why?" Reese says.

"He was supposed to send footage and an interview to us out of Syria yesterday. It's for a News Night report we're doing on terrorist recruitment of child soldiers," Maggie says. "I tried calling him five or six times, checked with the others he normally works with. Nobody has heard from him since last Wednesday." A bad feeling forms in the pit of Don's stomach.

"I called a couple of my guys in the area," Jim says. "A couple contacts in the Syrian government. He's missing. They're pretty sure he's been taken hostage."


	14. Chapter Thirteen — Maggie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all! Slowly but surely, I'm coming back, and I hope you're still around as well. This is a lot more "action-y" than I am used to in this piece, but I did want to put the "news" back in Newsroom. It's an experiment, and based on the cliffhanger I had to follow through. So would love to know thoughts! I've long planned on using Qumar in this capacity as a Sorkin-y nod, but then he up and did the same thing with Equitorial Kundu in this season's plotline. So thanks, Aaron Sorkin, for stealing your own idea first and doing it better than I ever could (again).
> 
> Finally, just wanted to say, as I'm laid up in a tryptophan coma from yesterday, that I am thankful for all of you. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this chapter. The quote at the beginning, I think, is particularly revealing.

Maggie

"There is no cure except to live the hell out of our lives, to take it apart, to put it back together, to dig it all up, and then fill the hole. To help ourselves and one another to the best of our abilities. To believe everything entirely, while also calling bullshit for what it is." — Cheryl Strayed, "Tiny Beautiful Things"

October

Within seconds of their ungraceful burst into Reese's office, everyone is on the phone: Don's yelling at some contact with State and Reese is on the phone with their lawyers and Charlie's on the phone with the NSA or the CIA or somebody and Jim is calling … someone. Jim is calling someone.

She spins through her phone to find Matt Ruhle's information; he's a contractor, so it's sparse, to say the least. There's one emergency contact — his mother, in upstate New York — but it was last updated in 2013. She dials Charlotte, twenty floors below them in the newsroom. "I need everything on Matt Ruhle you can find. Spouse, partner, kids, parents, anything. Personal and financial details. And let's start figuring out if this was a random kidnapping of a journalist or if someone had a beef with him in particular, OK? Call me back in twenty minutes." She hangs up.

"Maggie! Over here!" Don yells, pointing to his cell.

"It's not a landline, you can move with it," she points out. Don looks momentarily stunned.

"Right, here you go, Alexander Graham Bell."

"That reference doesn't make any sense, skippy," she retorts. "Hello?"

"Maggie Jordan? This is Avner Marshall Hall, chief of staff for the Deputy Secretary of State. I understand that you've been in charge of tracking down information about Mr. Ruhle?"

"Yes, he's a freelance videographer and journalist who is based out of Jerusalem; we've used him in the past."

"Is he Jewish?"

"No. I don't know what he is, but he's not Jewish," she says. Her stomach is rapidly sinking, is currently somewhere around her feet. Soon it will be two floors down. "We've worked with him — I don't know how long, I've only been here a couple months — but we've worked with him for a couple of years now. He's good. Dependable, good sources. Smart. Everyone who goes over there is a bit of a risk-taker but he wouldn't take unnecessary risks."

"He's been doing this for five years," Jim says, hanging up his phone.

"Right. He's been doing this for five years," Maggie says into the phone. "Last week we contacted him to do a story about al-Shabaab and ISIS recruiting child soldiers into their operations. He left from Jerusalem to Mogudishu thirteen days ago, and head to Damascus four days later. We last heard from him on Tuesday, a week ago, that he was heading to Aleppo. He arrived safely, he had dinner on with friends on Wednesday, talked to them about his assignment. He was going to try and find a few families where the children had been kidnapped — he was headed into a few rural towns. He was expected to be back by Saturday, but from what we can tell, nobody has seen him. Not too unusual, according to his friends. He was supposed to check in yesterday but didn't, so this morning I tried calling. I couldn't get ahold of him and started calling contacts. When they hadn't seen him, we tried back channels —"

"Who are your back channels?"

"Journalists, in the region. Friendly locals. Word on the ground is that an independent group got an American journalist that they're trying to sell. It sounds ragtag — the leader may have a few debts that he owes guys with bigger guns."

"So he's somewhere in the Aleppo governorate?"

"Possible. It's been five days, so he could be over the border in Iraq right now. You guys haven't heard anything?"

"No," Avner sighs. Maggie decides he must be British. "We're going to set up a secure video line with the Secretary and the Pentagon. Is your team available in twenty minutes?"

"Uh, sure," Maggie says.

"Do you have a secure link?"

"We're a cable news —"

"Do you have a secure link?"

"Yes, in our conference room."

"Maggie!" Charlotte says, appearing in the doorway. She looks young and does a double-take when she sees Charlie and Reese in the room. "I have his family information."

"Don't contact the family just yet," Avner says, overhearing.

"But they deserve —"

"Don't. Twenty minutes." Avner's voice is crisp as he hangs up.

She hands the phone back to Don. "What do we have, Charlotte?"

"There's a wife, Sophie-Anne, and a two-year-old daughter, Lulu. Normally they live in Jerusalem with him, but she's having a high-risk pregnancy and so she moved back to suburban Virginia where her parents live. She's an assistant professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Teaches astrophysics. The number and address for his mother and stepfather are still the same as in the folder."

"She's an astrophysicist?" Charlie sounds impressed. He's always had a weird fixation with space.

"It's easier to see certain stars from —" Charlotte starts.

"Nobody in this room is going to understand the explanation, but Charlie's going to pretend he does," Don interrupts. "Is she Jewish?"

"No, she's French with dual citizenship. The university is kind of a mecca—"

"Wrong word choice," Charlie winces.

"—Kind of an … attraction for astrophysicists because it's —"

"—Easier to see certain stars from there. Got it," Don says. "When is she due?"

"Due where?"

"With her child. When is she due?"

"Early next year," Charlotte replies.

Reese puts his cell down. "My mother is on her way."

"My buddy Adam is coming in as well," Jim says. "Former MARSOC. Now he runs Polaris Securities. He'll be here in twenty to advise us. Charlotte, what else did you learn about his family? Are his parents well-off?"

She shrugs. "I can't say for sure, but mom's a kindergarten teacher and stepdad's a partner at a law firm with two lawyers in a town with three thousand people. His dad lives in Connecticut and his a sculptor. Doesn't appear to be very successful, and the photos of his work make clear why. Never remarried."

"So no," Don says. "What about the wife?"

"Her father was a diplomat and now runs an import-export business. Well off but not like Julia Louis-Dreyfus."

"What does the woman from Seinfeld have anything to do with this?" Charlie asks.

"She's a gazillionaire," Maggie supplies.

"That's the technical term," Jim adds.

"More like the mid-nine figures," Don says.

"How do you know that?" Maggie asks.

"Sloan's family has weird connections," Don shakes his head.

"Focus!" Charlie yells. "The point is, it's random. Yes? It's not a targeted kidnapping."

"Nothing points to that, no," Jim says, scratching his head.

"Is that a double negative —"

"It's not targeted, is what I mean."

"We need to find out who has him, how they got him, and whether or not he's alive," Don summarizes.

"Damn straight you do," a voice Maggie barely recognizes booms from the doorway.

She and Jim jump up. "Leona," Don says, also scrambling to stand, but casually, because he's a big shot now. Though he does call her Leona. Jesus, he's come a long ways.

"Oh my god," Charlotte says.

"Hello, Mother," Reese says.

"I hear we have a situation?"

"Situation is when the cafeteria runs out of blueberry Greek yogurt and the interns whine. What we have is a clusterfuck," Reese says. "We might be looking at another Daniel Pearl or James Foley situation."

"Well," Leona says. "Let's stop that from happening."

"Talking to Washington in … now," Reese says, flicking his wrist up and down quickly to check his watch. "Let's go."

"Where are you going?" Charlotte asks as they all stand.

"Conference room," Jim says. "Thanks Charlotte. Knock three times before you enter again."

"Has anyone gotten any smoke signals from the kidnappers? Any noise about ransom? Proof of life?" Charlie quizzes en route.

"Nothing," Maggie emphasizes. She can't help but feel like she failed somehow. She and Jim assigned Matthew to this — she had said, We want to talk child soldiers in Syria and Jim had said, I know a guy. They may have just gotten him killed.

They are no good, on so many levels.

Jim's phone rings, and he snaps it up. "Adam? Hey. Awesome. Twenty-third floor," he hangs up. "Adam's here. He'll be up soon."

"You trust him?" Don asks.

"With my life. I was embedded with him," Jim says. They enter the conference room, where the link is hot. The camera peers into a blue-lit room somewhere anonymous in D.C., where two men sit at a conference table.

"Avner?" Maggie tries, taking a seat.

"Yes, here," he smiles, and he's basically exactly what she pictured: mannered, with a distinct Roger Sterling vibe and square hipster glasses. His suit is a trendy blue. "You must be Maggie. This is my colleague, Mike Whitesails. He's the senior communications deputy here. And hello, Don. Good to see you again," Mike Whitesails is considerably more disheveled and getting paunchy.

"Hey Avner, hey Mike," Don says with familiarity. "How's it going?"

"Let me guess, you guys played tennis?" Maggie smirks. Don, in his Washington days, seems to have played tennis with every chief of staff, departmental deputy director, and associate editor currently working in D.C.

"Yes, fine, but it was a league of guys with a lot of potential," Don says. "Also, you do remember my mother-in-law is an assistant secretary of state, right? I can know people through other routes."

"Am I missing something?" Jim asks.

"No. Mike, this is Reese Lansing, president of ACN; Leona Lansing, president and CEO of AWM; Charlie Skinner, our president of news; Jim Harper, our international news director; and Maggie Jordan, the senior producer for News Night who figured out that Matt was missing."

"Great. As soon as the Pentagon — oh," a light blinks and another screen opens, "they're here. Perfect."

"Amira Pennington, senior analyst, Syria, here with Trevor Auerbach, CENTCOM; Patrick Odel, AFRICOM; and Martin Ponitz, Defense Intelligence. We asked a friend at the NSA to join, I hope you don't mind. He'll be on in a second."

"I'm here," a voice chimes as another picture appears. "Terrence Hanrahan, NSA."

"We all here, or are we waiting for the president too?" Don quips.

"Glad to see you're taking this seriously," Amira says drily.

"Listen. This guy's on the front line for us. Our code of ethics is the same as yours here: Leave no man behind," Don comes back. "If you guys have all got your party present and are ready to start looking, great. Otherwise I'm happy to use my fucking cameras to broadcast this, my phones to call his family, and my company's coffers to pay whatever the fuck ransom to bring him home. And while they're not the deepest pockets, they're sure as hell easier to access than the U.S. government's. We're playing ball here, we're doing things your way, as a courtesy."

Amira nods. "Noted, sir. "

"Thank you," Reese says. "No, do we know anything about who might've taken him and where they're keeping him?"

"There's a village in the southern part of the governorate, Haqib Maskanah, which is run mainly by a local politician —"

"A warlord?" Reese asks.

Trevor Auerbach shrugs. "We don't use that term in Syria."

"Why not?"

"They're more political than militaristic; they don't quite have the consolidation of power; and, quite frankly, there's no way, with ISIS and al-Shabaab and al-Qaeda and what's left of the Syrian Army, for them to consolidate arms and gain a strategic foothold. He's a local guy who swaggers and has a chip on his shoulder," Auerbach shrugs. "Anyways. Abdul Aziz Hariq. He's kidnapped journalists and aid workers before, sold them to a larger al-Shabaab affiliated group. Last Saturday, he went to Manbij, the main city in his district, and spent nearly ten thousand U.S. dollars. Scarves, carpets, furniture, jewelry for his wife and daughters."

"You think he sold him for … hostage purposes?"

"There hasn't been any uptick in chatter, so we can't say for sure," Terrence Hanrahan says. "But this is the most likely scenario."

"So what's your plan for getting him back?" Mrs. Lansing asks.

"I need to stress that it is the absolute policy of this Administration and this country that we do not negotiate with terrorists. We do not pay ransoms. We do not do prisoner exchanges," Avner speaks up. "To do so would set a dangerous precedent."

"And part of that is keeping his family in the dark?"

"Until we know for sure who has him and what their demands are, we ask that you do not go to press with this," Avner replies firmly. "This is your first time dealing with this; we have done it nearly forty times since 2004. Keeping this under wraps is the only way we move faster than them, so people outside this room should not find out. We'll contact the family discreetly and see if they've heard anything; frequently, they've received an email and are not saying anything because they've been informed that otherwise, he will be killed."

"I'll contact them, if it's all the same to you," Don rebuts. "It's our network and our assignment that landed him there."

Avner nods. "Very well. Do let me know when you've contacted him and I'll follow up."

"Nobody has answered my question," Leona says. Maggie wants to be as kickass as Leona when she is seventy-five. "What is the plan to rescue him?"

"If we can get a bead on his location, we'll try and send in a team of special ops," Trevor says.

"I'd like a bead on his location, then," Leona replies.

"Yes ma'am," the head of AFRICOM says meekly. Maggie smirks.

"Is there anyone in the area we can talk to? We don't have a lot of friends over there, but surely someone can help out?" Reese suggests.

"You'd wanna talk to Qumar," Jim says.

"He's right," Amira replies. "We have the CENTCOM base there. It's where we would base a rescue operation."

"The Qumari government also has pretty close ties to both al-Shabaab and ISIS, so they're helpful in that regard, too," Jim points out.

Everyone in every little box on the screen stiffens. "We do not condone all of the Qumari government's friends in the area, but the fact remains, that they are our best friend."

"And our richest — they profit off our planes, our bases, and the oil they buy from terrorist governments. We get the politics," Don says.

"It must be nice to be that smug, Mr. Keefer," Amira observes. "Sitting there, throwing fires, getting to cast judgment on how we treat an incredibly difficult and fractious part of the world."

"I'm not trying to be smug," Don explains, his tone keying down. It's true; smug is his default. "I'm just … I'm pissed. We lost one of our guys. He doesn't sign up to die; he doesn't sign up to defend our country. For crap pay and shoestring benefits, he signs up to point his camera and try and make people listen. I've known plenty of these guys in my life, including this one —" he points to Jim, "and they have all the respect in the world for the military. All they're trying to do is point their camera, and get people to listen. So I'd like to get him home, yesterday."

"So do we," Mike interrupts. "You're calling the family now?"

"Yeah," Don says. "I'll call you when we're done." They disconnect.

Mrs. Lansing leans back. "It has been my longstanding policy not to negotiate with madmen, but I will gladly make an exception in this case."

"I think we need to follow the government's lead," Reese says.

"That guy is me," Jim speaks up. "He's Mac. We can't put anything but our full effort behind bringing him home."

"I agree, but we need to make sure that whatever decision we make doesn't lead to five more Macs or Matts or yous kidnapped next week. And paying a ransom to a group designated as a terrorist is actually illegal, and I'm not letting anyone get arrested again. Where's your friend?" Reese changes the subject abruptly.

"I … don't know," Jim looks around, then jumps up for the door. They all follow. "He should be here," they exit. "He's here," Jim announces.

Adam, or who Maggie supposes is Adam, is waiting outside in a crisp, dark suit. He's tall, with closely cropped brown hair and a square jaw. "Jim," he smiles, confirming Maggie's deduction. "Great to see you. And congrats on the wedding. The blender I sent got lost in the mail," he says wryly.

"Yeah, yeah. Thanks for coming in, man," Jim says with a backslap. "This is Charlie Skinner, the head of news, Reese Lansing, the president of ACN, Mrs. Leona Lansing, the president of AWM, Maggie Jordan, the senior producer of News Night, and Don Keefer, the — what's your title, anyways?" Prodigal son, basically.

"VP for breaking and primetime news. And stuff," Don smiles. "Adam, great to meet you, and thanks for helping us out. I have to call his wife, so please excuse me."

"I want to be on the call," Maggie says quickly, moving toward Don.

"No, you don't, because I don't," Don points out. "Fill Adam in here. Come find me in twenty minutes." He and Charlie head down one way, and Reese and Mrs. Lansing depart for god-knows-where in the opposite direction.

'Why don't we come back in the conference room?" Jim says. "Can I get you water or coffee or something?"

"I'm good, thanks," he grins.

"So Jim was embedded with you? Do you have any stories?" Maggie asks. "The blackmail type, to be clear; not the heroic type."

"Whatever you tell her, remember that I know far worse about you," Jim warns with a laugh.

"Jim always took the top bunk because he was scared of spiders," Adam says immediately. Despite the gravity of the situation, Maggie bursts out laughing. It feels good.

"That's unsurprising."

"Eight legs is not natural," Jim insists.

"How long were you over there?"

"I served on active duty through the end of 2013. 2014 was this," he lifts his right pants leg to reveal a titanium leg, "in Germany and D.C. Decided to come to New York after that, got an MBA at Columbia, and followed a buddy into private security. So you're Maggie, huh?" He weights it just enough power so she realizes he knows at least some of her history with Jim. "You're prettier than Jim ever let on."

"I am, on both counts," she smiles lightly. "What do we need to know?"

"It's more like what do I need to know," he snaps to business, then lets them know the long list of information they're going to need to get to him: last contact numbers, various friends in the region, groups he'd interacted with. They're tracking down this information when Don comes back in.

"We may have a problem," he announces bluntly.

"What's that?" Maggie asks, pushing some of her hair back.

"I spoke with the wife, Sophie-Anne. She … was not happy. Hysterical, actually. She hasn't heard from the kidnappers, so she's out of her mind with worry."

"That sounds about in line with how I would feel if I found out my husband had been kidnapped by terrorists," Maggie points out.

"That's not the problem. You know how we said he was comfortable but not, you know, Julia Louis-Dreyfus levels?"

"Is Sophie-Anne a Louis-Dreyfus?" Jim asks.

"No. But his mother … is."

"Is what?"

"Matt's mother is the daughter of Matthew Prentice."

"The industrial mogul from, like, 120 years ago?"

"No. That was his — this Matthew Prentice's — grandfather. That Matthew Prentice had a son, Jonathan, who took his money, reinvested it in real estate and stocks, and made even more money. He then had a son, Matthew, who became an engineer and had the first patent for a computer chip in 1956. He turned that into a fairly lucrative business of his own and probably would beaten Steve Jobs to the punch by about twenty years, but he and his wife died in a plane crash in Tahiti, leaving all that money to their only daughter."

There's a pause. "OK, really, how was I supposed to have known all of that?" Jim complains.

"So Matt's mother is worth, what a billion?" Adam gets them back on track.

"Times seven."

"She's worth seven billion? And she lives in upstate New York and teaches kindergarten?"

"Well, Sophie-Anne said her house was very nice," Don mocks. "I don't know, but we need to find out why. Because you know what this means?"

"If they figure out who they've got, there's suddenly a much higher price on his head. And since Sophie-Anne isn't an American citizen, she can pay the ransom as long as she's OK with never living in the U.S. again. France pays ransoms for its aid workers, and they wouldn't extradite her for this," Adam says after a beat. Maggie is impressed.

"Yeah," Don sighs, then takes a seat. "So we — or the government — has to figure out where he is, and get him back before they figure out what they're sitting on."

"Would it really be the worst thing?" Maggie asks impulsively.

"Would what?" Jim replies.

"Letting them pay the ransom. It'll get him home. We can broadcast that he's missing, that his mother is a gazillionaire and that his wife is pretty and pregnant and a French citizen. We basically do everything but put up his mother's email address," she feels herself getting worked up and her voice rising. "He's one of us. We have an obligation to do everything with can to bring him home."

"First off," Don says after a beat, "that's extra-governmental, what you're talking about here. That would have ramifications with sources here and in the Middle East. We're not sidestepping the government on this one."

"You were just fronting off to twelve people who probably know the nuclear codes!" Maggie exclaims.

"As a negotiating tactic," he rolls his eyes. "Listen. They have an army, and we just have the threat of public humiliation. One works damn well on governments but not so well on crazy foreign despotic potentates with fanatical religious beliefs and delusions of grandeur. The other works decently well on the crazy foreign despotic potentates with fanatical religious beliefs and delusions of grandeur."

"Good god you used a lot of synonyms for 'whackjob' in that sentence."

"It had rhythm," Don rebuts with a half-shrug. "We're going to give them time to at least get their feet fucking under them."

She turns to Adam. "How much time?"

"Excuse me?"

"If we do this Don's way —"

"—Which you have to, since I am your boss —"

"—How long should we do it Don's way?"

Adam hesitates. "They'll need at least two or three days."

"So after that?"

"While they're doing that, we gather our intel. And then you make a decision," Adam's voice is firm and final.

"What do we do now?" Maggie flounders.

Don looks at his watch. "Well, you have a show in seven hours, so I would suggest you go put that together."

"Seven hours?" she checks. Fuck. She flips to her phone. Three texts and two calls.

"Yeah, it's one," Don says. "You have your second rundown in an hour. Go give me a show. Jim, there's a big world out there. Break news. Adam, I want to speak with you for a bit, is that OK?"

"Absolutely," he replies.

"Fine," she says, and they file out.

"Maggie," Don calls as she and Jim exit.

"Yeah?"

"Two days. We'll give them two days and then we'll talk. But sit on it for now, OK?"

"For what it's worth I'm on your side," Jim informs her as they get into the elevator.

She gives him a small smile. "Thanks."

Jim gets off the elevator on his floor, and she thumbs her notebook for the remaining thirty-seven seconds of her journey. She's absolutely unsurprised by who's waiting at her seat.

"Brent," she smiles, approaching. "Listen, I'm really sorry about being late —"

"You sure you don't want to add an 'again' to that?" he smiles ruefully, standing to leave.

"When I say 'extenuating circumstances,' I really mean it," she says.

"I mean, I'd say I don't mind, except we moved our lunch three times. Not once, three times. It was supposed to be last Wednesday, then Friday, then Tuesday, then today. Three. Which wouldn't bother me — honestly, we're both busy, it happens — but we don't see each other otherwise, or really even talk betwen them, and I'm beginning to feel like you were trying to bail on it and I'm a rube for not picking up on the clues."

"I don't want to bail. I really — I couldn't get away."

"What's going on?" he gestures to the TV. "Because right now you've got an anchor covering what the First Lady might wear to a summit in three weeks." She glances at the TV; he's right. Her case doesn't look good.

"I can't tell you," she says. "I really can't. I'm sorry I missed lunch, but it was pretty important, and when I say I hope you never find out what I was doing because it's that important, I really mean that. It was that kind of meeting."

He pauses, clearly skeptical at her weak defense. "Alright. I … I'm going back to work." She gets the distinct, familiar feeling that he's not going to call her again. "It was … Nice seeing you, Maggie." He turns with a small smile and walks off.

"Yeah," she adds, faintly. Saying something perfunctory like 'I'll see you soon' almost sounds insulting.

For the next two days she throws herself into work to keep the anxiety at bay. On Friday, when she goes to bug Don about the lack of information over lunch, he stops her and says, "Before you say anything, I know it's been two days. I know we need to make a decision. Come over to our place after News Night."

"And talk, I assume," she completes his thought.

"Obviously. Rebecca, Reese, Adam, Jim, Charlie, Will, Neal, and Mac are coming. We're ordering Chinese. Sloan's gonna send you a Google form to fill out with your order. Fill it out to the T. Always fill out Sloan's forms to the T."

"Why are Neal and Will and Mac coming?"

"Well, Mac has valuable knowledge about reporting in the Middle East and Neal has valuable knowledge about how to potentially access his files and trace his digital footprint and do … whatever with that information, and Will was jealous when he found out that we asked Rebecca Halliday for her legal advice instead of his."

That makes sense. "That makes sense."

"Fill out Sloan's Google form."

That night, she's trying to figure out how to knock quietly without waking the kids when Sloan opens the door. "I have a sense," she explains.

"Really?"

"Yes. Also, I heard your footsteps."

"I didn't want to wake the kids."

"No need to worry about that. They're all going to wake up no matter what, because they are lovable, tiny terrorists who have been passing around a head cold like it's a hot potato for the last two weeks. Susannah has it now. Though I appreciate the consideration. You're moo shu pork?"

"And egg roll," she repeats her order promptly, because she filled out her Google doc. Sloan hands her two white cartons and a baggie.

"Mac, Will, and Don are in the library," Sloan smiles. "If you want to join them."

"You coming?"

"Tiny, lovable terrorists are going to wake up ten minutes sooner if I'm not listening at the door," Sloan smiles without any teeth. She's dressed simply, in skinny black jeans and a thick, oatmeal-colored fisherman's sweater. Maggie's always envied how defiantly, consistently herself Sloan is no matter what the environment: high-stakes board meeting, breaking-news broadcast, hosting her husband's underlings for Chinese food at 10 pm on a Friday.

"You want company?"

"I have wine, and this isn't my problem," she says, lifting her (very full) glass. "It's yours. And you guys should go solve it before I get to the network and it becomes my problem." She cocks her head. "Someone's coming. One sec."

"I can get it," she volunteers.

"Nah, it's fine," Sloan says. "You eat. Grab wine if you want." She's heading out of the kitchen when the doorbell rings. "Fucking A," she swears. "You get the door. I'll get the kid."

"It sounds like they're still —" a weak cry cracks through the air and Sloan raises her eyebrows to say told you. "Nevermind. Sure."

It's Jim, Neal, and Adam, and she lets them in with a warning: "A kid just woke up. They've been sick and Sloan's not happy."

"Which one? I'm great with Emerson, if she needs help," Jim boasts.

"Yeah, it's probably Susannah, but I think Sloan can handle her own kids," Maggie rolls her eyes. "Come on in. Food's in the kitchen."

"Excellent. I'm starved," Neal grins, and the three head in.

"Hold the door!" Charlie calls from down the hall, and she pulls it back open.

"Glad you could make it," she greets him.

"Couldn't miss it. Literally," he points out.

"Where's Sloan?"

"Here," Sloan says from behind them, her footfalls simultaneously bouncy and thudding on the steps. Susannah, her head crooked heavily in Sloan's neck and her eyes lidded and a thumb twisted in her mouth, is perched on her hip.

"Does she need some Grandpa Charlie time?" He reaches out, and Sloan shakes her head.

"She's good. Just needs to be held." Charlie shrugs. Sloan smooths out Susannah's long hair.

"Why are we in the doorway?" Reese says from behind them all.

"Hey," Sloan says. "Because we thought about it and decided that yes, this is absolutely the best place for a fairly serious and important conversation to take place," she snarks. "We're all standing here because we're all standing here. By the way, thanks for filling out the Google Doc. Much appreciated."

"I didn't have time, and Sloan, we've gotten Chinese food what, twenty times before? You know I like —"

"It doesn't matter. I just doubled Don's order."

"He gets shrimp and I get beef and I hate shrimp!"

"Respect the form, Reese," Sloan says sternly. Maggie thinks she's kidding but knows never to be quite sure with Sloan. "Food's in the kitchen, we're in the living room."

"Hey," Don says as they all enter. He's huddled with Mac, Will, and three containers of food. "Everybody here?"

"Everyone except Rebecca," Sloan says.

"Do you want me to take her?" Don extends his arms in a helpful gesture, but Annie — who looks incredibly sleepy — makes a noise between a grunt and a whine as she re-burrows her head into Sloan's shoulder.

Sloan sighs. "I'm just gonna bounce her," she says.

There's a knock at the door. "I'll get it," Mac volunteers, standing.

"Hey, you did order me kung pao beef," Reese exclaims, tearing the lid of his container off happily.

"Consider that your reprieve," Sloan declares benevolently.

"Hello everyone," Rebecca Halliday announces in that radio-smooth voice of hers. "Ready to hear what sort of fresh hell you've gotten AWM into now, McAvoy."

"Oh, no, this is all the young turks," he replies. "I'm just here in an advisory capacity."

"An advisory capacity, or your FOMO?'

"Listen, mofo —"

"FOMO. Fear Of Missing Out. 's Word of the Year in 2015. Or did you miss that too?" Rebecca retorts smoothly.

"Alright, alright," Don mediates. "Let's focus. Rebecca, your food is there, grab some chopsticks. I'd like to be in bed before 1, please."

"So, catch me up?" Neal says. "What have I missed?"

They take turns chowing down rice and filling in the blanks for Neal, who nods as he shovels chicken into his mouth. Sloan chimes in with a few questions of her own as she walks Susannah back to sleep and they talk different strategies for figuring out where he is.

"Where does State think he is?" Mac asks.

"There are a few camps they see as likely, and they're checking around there. But no suspicious or new movement," Reese replies.

"But if they think they're likely, why won't they raid them?"

"Because they raid and they're wrong, and they know we know," Don summarizes. "Let's go over our options."

"Option one, we leave it to the U.S. government, whose job it fucking is, and stop playing I Spy," Will offers.

"We have an obligation —" Jim starts.

"To get him home safely. Playing vigilante journalist isn't going to help that."

"Option two," Don says, moving the conversation forward.

"Broadcast," Neal says simply. "Go live on TV and say what's happened. Tell the truth."

"Nobody has ever come back alive after exercising that option," Will points out. "We do that and we show our hand. What has worked is letting the U.S. military do their job."

"There's Maggie's idea. We let them figure out that he's rich and contact the family for ransom. The family pays the ransom and goes to live abroad, or they stay here and the government tries to jail a family for trying to rescue their kidnapped son," Jim says. She's a little surprised he credited her, but she'll take it. But she is not convinced this is an unethical path to take.

"No," Don says immediately.

"None of us actually disagree with them paying a ransom, do we, if it gets him back alive? It's a dirty business, but let's not let our morality get in the way of saving his life," she argues back.

"As someone who is going to be sending other journalists to that area, yes, I'm putting practicality in front of that morality, because that puts them at a higher risk of kidnap," Don says. "This one was accidental. But we rig a situation where the next ten guys I send there are at a higher risk? That's on me."

"I agree with Don," Charlie adds.

"Me too," Reese echoes. "We need a plan, and that's not a plan."

"There's something else you could do," Adam suggests. "Go to Qumar."

"What?" Sloan asks skeptically. Susannah is now asleep, so she carefully sits next to Don, peeling the toddler off her and arranging her on the couch. "We're not diplomats. We're not going to negotiate."

"You wouldn't be. The Qumari government has influence in the region, but we can influence them. If we can pinpoint exactly who has him, and they have ties, the government could be our allies. Persuade them to release him."

"The Qumari government is basically a bunch of thugs with a blank checkbook and a U.S. military base. You really think we can — and should — get them on our side?" Don asks. He's not convinced either.

"They are on our side. And I think they have, or can get, information that we want," Adam shrugs.

"And it's that simple?" Charlie says skeptically. "It's never that simple."

"It is that simple. It's negotiating with terrorists," Sloan says.

"They're not terrorists, they're an ally," Mac points out. She knocks her head from side to side, vacillating. "Technically."

"We'd be sending people over there to talk to government officials to nudge them into talking to a bunch of terrorists. That is edging dangerously close to negotiating with terrorists. We're not Sean Connery; we don't play spies on TV," Will says, irritated. "Not one of you has made the case that any of us going over to talk to him would be anything but a grown-up version of playing house."

"I'm with Jack McCoy over there," Rebecca says. "None of you are even on the same block as diplomats — you don't know the definition of tact. But, most importantly, none of you are spies."

"I'm not saying you go as diplomats or spies or even tactful businesspeople. Just journalists. You're playing by the government's rules. You're going to pay me a lot of money to track his movements and figure out where he is. But this sends the signal that you're willing to negotiate. We OK it with the government."

"How will that not piss them off?" Jim asks.

Adam shrugs. "If we go to Qumar and they're friendly, we get valuable information. We go to Qumar and they're dirty —"

"It will probably lead to the kidnappers," Will finishes.

"And we can track them much more easily," Neal connects the dots.

"The guys from State did suggest Qumar as a possible source of information," Reese adds, giving them all the tacit yes.

"We're clearing this with State," Rebecca warns.

"Absolutely," Adam promises. "I'm not saying we be spies. At all. Don, Maggie, Jim, you guys in?"

"Oh, whoa, I'm not going," Don says. "I can't go."

"He's right," Sloan says. "My mother is the fourth-highest-ranking official at the State Department. He'll look like a representative of the U.S., not ACN."

"I'll go," Will volunteers.

"You sure?" Adam checks.

"Everyone likes a TV star," he shrugs.

Mac smacks her face into her palm. "Honey, nobody likes when you say that."

They plot for a little while longer, and then Don kicks them all out. Rebecca and Reese exit swiftly, wrapping their expensive cashmere coats around them. Mac disappears upstairs to pick up a sleeping Nora from Max's room, and Sloan goes with her to return Susannah. The rest of them linger in the hallway, fussing with their gloves and coats and debating whether or not the scarves are necessary, until Mac staggers downstairs with Nora. Will rolls his eyes and takes her from Mac, muttering, "You're not as strong as you think you are."

"Pilates is great for the upper-body state, old man," she retorts. "When was the last time you worked out, when you were baling hay in the 60s?"

The rest of them take the elevator down together, and Will and Mac quickly hail a cab. She, Jim, Neal, and Adam look sideways at one another. "Anyone want to get a drink?" she tries.

"I should get back to Mariah — she wasn't too impressed with a 10 p.m. Friday-night meeting that I couldn't tell her anything about," Neal says.

"Same. Well, not the same, but with Alicia," Jim says. She nods, understanding, and Neal moves to kiss her cheek. After a beat, Jim does the same.

She stands with Adam as they walk off. "I'd actually be down for that drink," Adam offers.

She thinks for a second. It's past midnight, but given her schedule, that's fairly early. "Sure," she says. "There's a bar I like a couple blocks over on Broadway."

"You live in this area?"

"Down in Chelsea, actually."

"Nice area."

"Yeah? Where're you?"

"Red Hook."

"Brooklyn? No kidding?"

"I wanted a little extra space."

"So you picked Brooklyn?" she laughs. "I think at this point Midtown has more extra space than Brooklyn."

"The last time I really knew New York was, like 2002," he clearly finds this hilarious too.

"Things are different now, huh?" she grins.

"Little bit. I didn't even realize the cupcake craze was over."

"So you've been abroad since 2002?"

"I grew up in Connecticut, so came down pretty often. Went to Seattle for college, got an engineering degree, and then went abroad after 2006."

"How'd you end up in the military?"

"My dad fought in Vietnam, and always bet my brother and I that we couldn't survive OCS. My brother tried it and couldn't make it in. I bet them both five grand I could."

"And then you ended up in Afghanistan."

"And then I ended up in Afghanistan. It sounds crazy, but I loved it."

"You're right, that does sound crazy. Especially since …" she trails off.

"The leg?"

"Well, yeah."

"Well, don't get me wrong. That sucked. A lot. But the camaraderie, the work, semper fi? It's what I needed to be doing in my 20s."

"What were you doing?"

"I was an engineer for about a year, then went into infantry. Made it onto the Ops team and eventually did tactical stuff for them."

"Engineering?"

"Yeah."

"So how did —"

"The leg? Was in a Humvee heading to Jalalabad from Kabul and hit a mine," he shrugs. "Wasn't even in combat." He holds the door to Maddy's open for her. "So you dated Jim once, huh?"

"Yeah. It was a long time ago," she smirks and lifts one shoulder to downplay its seriousness. "Another life, almost."

"What do you mean?"

"You know how sometimes, when you're in the middle of something, and it feels like it's right and it's perfect? And then it ends and afterwards it feels like those things happened to another person entirely, but you're still kind of surprised because everything in the new life is fine too — different, but fine? Doesn't have to be a relationship — it's like, when you graduate college. When you're in it you can't imagine it ending and when you're out it's something new but not the end of the world. It's like that," she says without acrimony. Being around Jim, with his particular combination of stubbornness and arrogance and idealism and smarminess, she's beginning to remember the less-good sides of their relationship. She now remembers the breakup without bitterness, without anger, without anything. She supposes that's the ultimate sign that she's over it: In the fallout from their first kiss, when he's jumped off the Sex and the City tour bus, she'd swiped at him pettily for more than a year. She cared then. Now she feels either empty or nothing.

"I do, yeah," he says. She likes him.

They stay out talking for another hour, and then, like a gentleman, he sticks her in a cab back down to her place. There's a pause when she thinks he wants to kiss her, but she ducks and steps back to avoid it. Still, she smiles on the way home.

Four Sundays later, she's nestling into the plush leather seat on her first private-plane ride when Adam sits down next to her. "Can I get you something from the mini-bar?" he asks, his voice and mannerisms jokingly exaggerated like he's a character in Downton Abbey.

"Why thank you, but I should probably wait. It's a long flight, and I don't want to spend too much of Mrs. Lansing's money," she smiles. The whole expedition is stomach-curdling. She still can't believe Rebecca and the Lansings and the State Department and the NSA and god knows how many other government agencies signed off on this, but they're going. Nobody from al-Shabaab or ISIS has contacted the family yet, but Maggie can't help but think it's only a matter of time. So she and Will and Jim and Adam are flying Teeterboro to Zurich (for a refuel) to Jatara to meet with the deputy foreign minister. It's going to be a tremendously short trip: Between the twenty-hour trip and the time change, they won't be getting until late Monday. They'll crash at their hotel before a lunchtime meeting, and then hopping on a plane to get back in New York by late afternoon Wednesday. They have to make it back, as the next day is Thanksgiving, and Mac will kill Will if he misses Nora's first Thanksgiving.

"Suit yourself," he grins, and gets up to grab a drink.

"Yo, Adam, come play cards. There's a table on this thing!" Jim calls gleefully from down the aisle. Maggie can appreciate that. Who knew there was so much room on a 737? Adam grabs two beers and heads down to join Jim.

Will takes the seat next to her as the guys' conversation drifts over her mindlessly. "Brushing up on your Arabic?" he asks skeptically.

"I always figure out how to say, 'Where is the bathroom?' and 'Stop that man! He has my purse!' in the language I need to know before traveling," she shrugs.

"You're going to spend your entire trip at the hotel, at the Palace, or in a car to the airport, and you're worried about your purse getting stolen? By whom? The Prince? He's the 37th richest person in the world."

"I know it's irrational but —" she hesitates, "when I left ACN, Mac sent me this bag. She told me I needed to take it on all my adventures. It's been to sixteen countries, including South Korea, China, South Africa, and Russia."

Will nods, slightly chastened. He gets it. "So Adam seems very nice."

She smirks. She enjoys whenever Will tries to get personal. She hopes for Nora's sake he never has to give her the sex talk. "He does. Smart too. Gee whiz, Mary Jane, do you think he'll ask me to go to the sock hop with him next week?" she teases.

"I get your point, fine, fine," he says. "I'm … You know we're all very happy that you came back to New York, right, Maggie?"

"I know," she leans back, apprising him.

"And I hope you're happy to be back."

"I am," she replies.

"But?"

"No buts," she insists. "I'm happy to be back."

He studies her. "Happiness is hard, isn't it? People like you and me, we don't trust it too much. You have it and it's great, you lose it and you never trust you'll have it again. We don't put too much stock in it. We tell ourselves it's not the most important thing to have: We like stability better, we like competency better, we like neatness better. We know there are worse things in life than being unhappy, and we think happiness is a luxury."

"Uh-oh. Now we're getting into squicky territory of the heart, Dr. Will," she says. "See what I did there? Dr. Phil, Dr. Will?" She grins.

"You're a good person. And even if you weren't, you still would deserve to be happy. But letting yourself be happy is hard. It's scary. And you haven't seemed happy since you got back."

She stiffens. "I am, and I have been. How I … act happy, might've changed, but Will, I'm not your twenty-six-year old assistant to scared to correct you when you call me by the wrong name anymore."

He laughs. "No, you certainly are not. You lost the Bambi eyes years ago. Anyways. Just a word of advice from an old man, but it's much easier to let yourself be happy than continue fighting it. Even if the fighting is just reflexive."

She closes her eyes, then opens them. "Thanks, Will." He nods awkwardly and stands to move. As he passes her, she grabs his wrist. "I mean it," she says, looking up at him. "Thanks." He leans down and kisses her temple.

It's a ridiculously long trip, and by the time they land in Qumar she's so tired and disoriented by travel she's not sure she could tell anyone her middle name if asked. They're shipped immediately via Rolls Royce SUV to the hotel, which is owned by the Prince's brother-in-law and has doorknobs that cost more than Maggie will ever make it in her life. They are handed unmarked gold keycards within minutes, and are in the elevator twenty minutes after leaving the airfield. But still — "I just don't understand how we totally missed Monday," she yawns as the elevators glide upwards. "Where did it go? When did it happen for us? What is time?"

"A flat circle," Adam cracks.

"Old joke," she chides, disappointed. The elevator pings at 17. "We're on 21."

"No, I'm on 17," Will says.

"Did you get a suite?" she gasps as he steps off with a wave.

"I'm on 17 too," Jim says, grabbing his bag. "See you guys tomorrow. Get some sleep."

"You don't have a suite," she hears Will inform Jim as the doors slide shut.

She smiles at Adam. "Even though I don't know what day it is — or even what a day is anymore — that plane flight was worth it."

"Not sure how I'm going to go back to business class," he agrees. "You ready for tomorrow?" The elevator pings on their floor.

"I … hope so," she replies. "Terrified. I hope this leads to something."

"He's supposed to be thoughtful. Fair," Adam says. She notices they're at his door, so she slows to a stop. He starts digging for his key, which he stupidly folded into his wallet already.

"Thanks for all your help on this," she says, purposefully loitering.

"Of course," he says, turning away from his door, and he's suddenly so close to her. Her eyes flick up for a second, and he's startled and expectant. She makes a decision, and pulls her lips to his.

**Author's Note:**

> Love it/hate it/think I shouldn't continue? Please let me know!


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